Practice report: Aug. 6

To use the idiom that a “cloud is hanging over someone’s head” is understood to mean that something bad has happened that will affect them, and maybe affect them for a long time: But to say that a cloud has been hanging over the Steelers’ heads recently means something much more literal, because that cloud has been loaded with rain.

On Thursday at Saint Vincent College, Coach Mike Tomlin had to shave the final 11 plays off the final competitive period when lightning moved into the area. The following day was to include Friday Night Lights, the team’s traditional short trip on yellow school buses for a night practice at Latrobe Stadium that’s a significant fundraiser for programs in the Latrobe School District and the community at large.

Invented by Coach Bill Cowher as a way of preparing his players for the changes in kickoff times they inevitably will face in every regular season, and then embraced by Tomlin for how it takes the players back to their football roots with the way it’s about boarding school buses and competing in the sport they love under the lights inside a high school stadium, Friday Night Lights starts with an autograph session and ends with a professional fireworks display that annually draws big crowds.

But for the first time in its history, Friday Night Lights had to be cancelled because of a combination of dangerous lightning and a downpour that flooded pockets of Unity Township. It rained so hard for so long that the grass fields on the Saint Vincent College campus remained too sodden to host Saturday’s afternoon practice.

The Steelers’ response to that was to load the team onto buses and make the trip to Pittsburgh to conduct the regularly scheduled 1:55 p.m. practice on the grass fields at the UPMC Rooney Sports Complex.

“I first want to start by saying we’re just really disappointed for the fans this weekend,” said Tomlin. “We were looking forward to entertaining them and gaining a lot of energy from those guys at Friday Night Lights and…