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Here's a question: When did last year's football season end for you?
For some residents of the Tri-State Area, the shift to passing interest from great interest came on New Year's Eve, when Ohio State suffered a 42-41 loss to Georgia in the semifinals of the College Football Playoff.
For many others, that moment came on Jan. 8. That's when the Steelers finished their season with a 28-14 win over Cleveland. That victory was the team's seventh in its last nine games and allowed the Steelers to finish with another winning season at 9-8, which, while it extended the streak of non-losing seasons to 19, was not good enough to earn a place in the playoffs.
Even while there were still a couple of important games to come -- Georgia earned the CFP title with a 65-7 win over TCU on Jan. 9 and Kansas City defeated Philadelphia 38-35 Feb. 12 in the Super Bowl -- for a large number of local fans, those losses at the end of December and the beginning of January marked the start of football's six-month off-season.
Not that the period did not hold some interesting moments -- there was the National Football League draft in April, and fans had the chance to watch the Maulers make it to the USFL title game, where they lost to Philadelphia 28-12. Though the team carried the name of Pittsburgh and changed its uniform colors from the purple, renaissance red and gray it wore during 1984, its only season in the original USFL (remember running back Mike Rozier and coach Joe Pendry?) and its first year in the made-for-TV relaunch of the league in 2022, to the black and gold shared among the Steelers, Pirates and Penguins, it played its home games in Canton.
Plus, our area has more than a passing interest in the Canadian Football League, where Steubenville High School graduates Zach Collaros and Najee Murray have found homes. That's despite the fact that it has become tougher to watch the CFL games in the United States than it has in the past. While ESPN and ESPN Plus had made it possible to watch all of the league's games in the past, the CFL's switch to CBS Sports Network has led to fewer games being available through cable TV, though every game can be seen on CFL Plus, which is accessible through phones, tablets and computers and can be cast to your television if you're willing to go that route.
All of that led to the frustration of tuning in to watch the July 1 matchup between Collaros' Winnipeg Blue Bombers and Murray's Montreal Alouettes and learning that, because the start of the game had been delayed when a storm went through Montreal, the telecast on CBSSN would end at 10 p.m. so the network could show a soccer game. To be fair, the remainder of the game could be seen online and at CFL Plus. Winnipeg won, 17-3, with Collaros completing 15 of 23 passes for 177 yards and two touchdowns. Murray finished the game with five tackles.
So, while the last several months have had their moments, it's reassuring to be able to say that the full-on return of football is not that far away -- it's Wednesday, when the Steelers report to St. Vincent College in Latrobe, Pa., for the start of training camp. As always fans will be able to attend camp, starting with the 1:55 p.m. session on Thursday and running through the 10:30 a.m. session on Aug. 17.
There's no charge to enter any of the 16 sessions that will be open to the public, but everyone who attends will need to have a mobile ticket, which can be obtained through Ticketmaster.
The Steelers open preseason play at 7 p.m. Aug. 11 when they visit Tampa Bay. That will be followed by a 6:30 p.m. game Aug. 19 against Buffalo in Acrisure Stadium and a 7:30 p.m. game Aug. 24 in Atlanta. Regular-season action will begin at 1 p.m. Sept. 10 when San Francisco visits Acrisure.
If you are a Steelers fan, you will find the camp very accessible. That's not the case with Cleveland, which will open camp at its Berea facility to fans only eight times, beginning Aug. 1. And, if you want to go, you'll need to get a ticket for your mobile device.
Camp for the Browns opened this weekend at the Greenbrier in White Sulpher Springs, W.Va. The early start is because the Browns will begin pre-season play at 8 p.m. Aug. 3 when they meet the New York Jets in the Hall of Fame Game in Canton. Cleveland will host Washington at 7:30 p.m. Aug. 11, travel to Philadelphia for a 7:30 p.m. Aug. 17 and close out the pre-season with a 1 p.m. game Aug. 26 in Kansas City. The regular season begins at 1 p.m. Sept. 10 with a home game against Cincinnati.
And, if you enjoy college football, the season will open Aug. 26, when Notre Dame takes on Navy in Dublin, Ireland. The rest of the schedule gets under way Sept. 2, with several key games for area fans, including WVU visiting Penn State and Ohio State hosting Indiana. Pitt opens that day against Wofford in Acrisure Stadium.
Locally, the unofficial start of the season happened at 7:15 p.m. July 22, when the 77th-annual Ohio Valley Athletic Conference Rudy Mumley All-Star Football game was played at Wheeling Island Stadium. That game annually starts the countdown to Aug. 17, when Steubenville Big Red visits Youngstown Ursuline and Indian Creek visits Cambridge to open the high school football season.
As always, the best way to get ready for the high school football season is to make sure you pick up a copy of Prep Football 2023. It's an award-winning publication, having been honored several times by the Ohio Associated Press Media Editors and the West Virginia Press Association. You will find it included in the Aug. 16 editions of the Herald-Star and The Weirton Daily Times.
(Gallabrese, a resident of Steubenville, is executive editor of the Herald-Star and The Weirton Daily Times.)