We knew a week like this was coming.

The path to this point had been established nearly four months earlier, when Gov. Andrew Cuomo finally greenlit the resumption of “high-risk” sports in New York and each section’s governing body for high school athletics outlined its plan to squeeze three seasons into the second half of the school year.

As part of that timetable, Section 6 would see a week of overlap between each campaign. Section 5, meanwhile, would be starting their second (Fall II) and third (spring) seasons a week earlier than its neighbor.

That meant, for one week in May, there was the potential for a convergence of seasons like none that had come before it — or will likely ever follow — a perfect storm of sports that almost assuredly had local ADs, coaches, athletes and parents (and sportswriters, to be certain) scrambling.

And that’s exactly how it played out.

To get a sense of just how bizarre a week it was, you’d merely have to look back to last Sunday. Here was a high school football playoff game … being contested in May … on a major holiday … on a Sunday night … in a snowstorm.

And that was only the beginning.

A WEEK that began with football also included the start of the Cattaraugus County spring campaign, the Section 6 volleyball playoffs, the North Tier League Track and Field Meet (in Pennsylvania) and the first county baseball and softball games played in nearly two years. It was a stretch that featured local track on Thursday, a sectional football championship on Friday and a sectional volleyball title match on Saturday.

Bizarre, indeed.

Ultimately, it was the “payback” week — and now begins the “payback” season — we knew would eventually be on the horizon.

For nearly 11 months, from March 2020 through early February of this year, among the only New York high school sports seasons contested were boys and girls soccer and cross country … both in the fall. And the further back those other fall and winter sports were pushed, the more certain it was — should those seasons be allowed — that come April or May, chaos would ensue.

And now, whatever unwanted “break” ADs and athletes, coaches and local scribes had during that 11-month period is being offset by a three-seasons-in-four-months sprint, unprecedented overlap between each campaign and, currently, a mad-dash spring season that will include its typically high volume of events PLUS remnants of the winter (Catt. County wrestling) and fall (girls golf).

INDEED, in just that week of May 9-15, the following sports were contested, and reported, locally: football, baseball, softball, track and field, boys golf, girls golf, boys tennis, wrestling and volleyball. Almost everything except basketball (from the abbreviated winter campaign) and the few sports played in the fall.

At nowhere, perhaps, was the commotion of the week felt more than Portville, whose football team hosted that playoff game on Mother’s Day and whose volleyball squad captured a sectional title in its home gym on Saturday, all while starting its spring and delayed wrestling seasons in between.

“This past Saturday was especially unique,” Portville athletic director Beth Colligan noted. “We held a four-school wrestling match in the morning, tore down and cleaned up the gym and set up for (volleyball) in the evening. We were lucky that Section 6 and Gowanda were flexible in letting us move the volleyball match to a later start (6 p.m.) because of the unique situation of having a wrestling match.

“It was also strange to be in a gym watching wrestling when it was sunny and 70 degrees out. Usually during wrestling, we’re watching the weather and hoping it doesn’t snow too much.”

YES, in a unique year, this was almost certainly the most unique week for local high school athletics as we might ever see.

And for as hectic as it had already been, it stands to only get busier — for everybody — over this final month of the school campaign.

But that’s okay.

You’d rather see local schools and athletes inundated with sports than ever again have to face the alternative.

“This whole year has been interesting with new challenges almost every day,” Colligan said. “But at the end of the day, I’m so glad that our athletes were able to play some sort of season this year.”

Of the frenzied nature of last week, and this final month-long stretch, she added: “Some of our volleyball players played on Saturday and (were) at their softball practice Monday getting ready for a game on Wednesday. Last weekend, we were playing football in the snow on Mother’s Day … I never thought I would say that I watched high school football on Mother’s Day, but it kind of sums up the year we’ve had.

“I will be glad to go back to ‘normal’ (whatever that may be) next year. I hope our teams and all the teams in New York are playing for a state title again. And I hope we all can look back at this year, learn from it, grow from it and realize how important sports are to our students.”

(J.P. Butler, Bradford Publishing Company group sports editor, can be reached at jbutler@oleantimesherald.com)