SIDELINE SCENE: First week back means more than just football

You’d hardly know it by the amount of time a few of my colleagues and I have spent putting together our 2015 Football Preview — 20 pages of awesome in this week’s paper (yay, shameless plug!) — but other sports besides the one America loves best are starting this week, too.

Volleyball, for instance.

Ocoee, which figures to be better this fall and whose coach, Cathy Edwards-Lee, likes her team’s chances in its new district — Class 7A, District 5 — will get a nice test when it hosts Dr. Phillips at 7 p.m. Aug. 27.

Those same Panthers, now in their first season after standout outside hitter Rachel Sawyer graduated, will follow that game against the Knights with an even tougher test when they take on Apopka on Sept. 1 — a program that figures to be among Central Florida’s best this fall.

Ross Usie’s Warriors, fresh off the best season in program history, will host Jones for their home opener at 7:30 p.m. Aug. 27.

Swimming and diving starts right up with some nice rivalry meets. West Orange, for instance, will take on Dr. Phillips Sept. 3 at the I-Drive YMCA Aquatics Center before turning around and hosting Olympia Sept. 10 at the Roper YMCA’s pool in Winter Garden.

The ultra-competitive prep golf scene also will get going within the week, with Dr. Phillips and Olympia’s boys squaring off Sept. 2 at Bay Hill. Dr. Phillips’ girls will be among the teams participating at the TFA Invite Sept. 5 at MetroWest Golf Club.

Cross-country gets underway, with a few local teams participating in the DeLand Invitational Aug. 29. And then, of course, there is bowling — which will make its triumphant return to Winter Garden Bowl when the season rolls around here in about two weeks.

All of which is just a long way of saying that, while we really love football, we’re excited about the stories that all of the other fall sports will allow us to tell, too.