Here are 3 key insights in 3 minutes on the 3rd day of the 3rd week at 3:33 PM that will hopefully make you want to do one of 3 things: Think more about it, share it with others, or do something with it.
It's the third week of October.
In a gym somewhere, a volleyball team is warming up for a playoff match while the boys' basketball coach waits by the door with a ball cart, because today is officially day one of practice.
Oh, and the wrestling coach just stopped by to ask about mat space.
Three seasons, one building, and an athletic director in the middle with a calendar that doesn't quite add up.
I hear some version of this from ADs every single October. Here are three things worth getting ahead of before November shows up.
1. Who's got the court?
Fall doesn't end on a tidy date. Volleyball runs deep into the postseason. Cross country has regionals. Football might still be playing in November. And all the while, winter coaches have been waiting since last spring for their first practice.
Every one of them assumes the gym is theirs now.
Nobody's being unreasonable. Everyone just carries a different idea of when the handoff actually happens, and the AD is the only one who can see the whole board.
The real trouble usually isn't the big, obvious conflicts. It's the small ones. A Tuesday night where two teams both think they've got the main court. A Saturday where the wrestling room is also serving as volleyball warm-up space.
Takeaway: Put every fall and winter practice and game on one calendar, week by week, and send it to every coach before the first winter practice.
2. The paperwork that shows up twice
Some of your winter athletes just wrapped a fall season, so their forms are already on file. Others are brand new to the department. And a few will walk into the first practice carrying a physical that expired sometime over the summer.
The issue isn't the paperwork itself — it's when you find out. Discover a missing physical on day one of tryouts and you're pulling a kid off the floor in front of the whole team. That's a rough moment for the athlete, the coach, and the parent sitting in the bleachers.
Here's the thing: the same list that tells you who signed up can also tell you who isn't cleared yet. It just has to get checked before anyone laces up.
Takeaway: Pull your winter sign-up list this week and check every name for clearance before the first practice — not during it.
3. The inventory nobody counted
Think back to last spring. Winter season wrapped, spring sports were already underway, and the end-of-season inventory got pushed to "later." Later slid into summer. Summer slid into this week.
Now a winter coach asks how many game jerseys are in the closet. The honest answer is nobody's sure. Maybe there are plenty. Maybe half of them walked out the door with last year's seniors. The only way to know is to dig through boxes while practice is happening down the hall.
A count takes a couple of hours in the spring. Skipping it costs a lot more than that in October — and it usually ends with a rushed order that runs higher than it should have.
This is exactly the kind of juggling we built Bound for: a department with a dozen moving parts and only a few weeks to line them all up.
Takeaway: Do a quick count of your winter gear this week, and put the end-of-season count on the calendar for next spring.
Pick one
Take one of these, not all three. And if a coach is standing at the gym door with a ball cart on the first day of practice, it's worth knowing — before they ask — who actually has the court.
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