Football takes break in Texas

The University of Houston could have played its football game at Texas-San Antonio on Saturday.

Instead the Cougars asked UTSA to postpone it after deciding there were things much more important than football this week with Houston besieged by catastrophic flooding from Hurricane Harvey.

“We felt like it wasn’t the right thing to do in terms of where our city is,” Houston’s first-year head coach Major Applewhite said. “Sports are important and sports are fun and its entertainment, but with casualties in our city, and the state of mind of our players and our players’ families, it’s not the right thing to do, to play a game.”

Texas-San Antonio president Taylor Eighmy agreed.

“As families across Southeast and South Central Texas struggle with the catastrophic flooding and impact of the storm, our focus must be on how we all can help,” Eighmy said.

The Cougars have been practicing in Austin since evacuating Houston ahead of the storm on Friday. Applewhite said football is secondary right now and they will figure out how to make the game up when conditions improve.

“Houston is across our chest for a reason,” he said.

The Cougars will not compete in any sports this weekend with events in cross country, volleyball and soccer also being canceled.