Houston-area teams take refuge from Harvey in North Texas

The Rice football will set up camp on the campus of TCU while the ravages of Hurricane Harvey continue to wreak havoc on Houston.

The week’s athletics schedule from South Texas to North Texas has been shaken up in the wake of the storm’s flooding.

Professional teams such as the Houston Texans and Houston Astros were forced to fly into Dallas/Fort Worth from out of state. Not only have Houston airports been closed because of the storm, but flooding has left getting to and from Minute Maid Park and Reliant Stadium a major safety concern.

The Texans worked out at the Cowboys’ The Star in Frisco Monday morning after flying into DFW from New Orleans Saturday night. The Astros flew into DFW from Los Angeles Sunday night after a series with the Angels.

The Astros were set to host the Rangers Tuesday-Thursday at Minute Maid Park but the league is considering moving that series to a neutral sites, including Tropicana Field in St. Petersburgh, Fla., or Busch Stadium in St. Louis.

Rice will set up temporary headquarters at TCU after flying in Monday from Los Angeles. Rice played Stanford on Saturday in Sydney, Australia. They don’t play against until Sept. 9 at UT El Paso.

“I want to thank the staffs at TCU, SMU, Baylor and UTEP who all reached out to offer whatever help we needed,” Rice head coach David Bailiff said. “There is a strong brotherhood in the coaching world and it is never more evident than at times like these. While we would love to be coming home today, our first responsibility is the safety of these players. We learned some lessons in 2008 (when the Owls were at Vanderbilt when Hurricane Ike struck Houston) about coming home too soon.”

LSU and BYU are supposed to play Saturday at Reliant Stadium in Houston but officials are actively looking for an alternative site, including Nashville and Orlando.

Texas high school football is supposed to start this week but most Houston-area games have already been canceled, including No. 2 Katy hosting No. 7 Austin Westlake, which was scheduled for Friday.

Major league baseball was still weighing its options with regard to the Astros-Rangers series but a decision was expected by noon Monday.

This story was originally published August 28, 2017 at 11:07 AM with the headline "Houston-area teams take refuge from Harvey in North Texas."