Syracuse Wins The 2008 - 2009 Golden Snowball Award

CONGRATS SYRACUSE

Winner of the 2008 - 2009 Golden Snowball Award

It's finally official and after a blowout season it's time to say those 3 words. It's a Wrap! Time to put this seasons contest in the books and way behind us. Congratulations Syracuse for winning the 2008 - 2009 golden snowball award with a respectable 149.6 inches of snow on the season! Should we cheer for another 4/10 of an inch to make it an even 150 inches of snowfall? I don't think so now that we have all gotten a taste of the nice spring weather we have been having.

The 2008 - 2009 Snow Season Summary

October - Binghamton started the 2008 - 2009 snow season out with the first snowfall right at the end of October with just under 3 inches to hold the first lead.

November - Bingo managed to hold the lead for a good part of November but then reality set in and Rochester bumped them out of first right around Nov. 20 - 21. Rochester's lead was pretty short lived though as Syracuse took over the King of The Snow Hill by November 22nd. Binghamton and Rochester sledded back and forth in the second place slot and both were pretty close to Syracuse all through November. Buffalo was still tuning up their snow making machine hoping it would be able to crank out enough snow this season to topple the now 6 repeat champion Syracuse.

December - December started off with Syracuse holding just an inch lead over Binghamton followed by Rochester, Buffalo and Albany. I think the biggest surprise for me was that Binghamton was able to hold on to second place all the way up until around December 17th when Rochester bumped them down to third place and then eventually Buffalo bumped them down to the number 4 spot where they would remain for the rest of the snow season. So much for my long shot pick :(

By the end of December Buffalo finally had it's snow machine, Lake Erie cranking and managed to slip by Rochester for second place right around the 26th - 27th. The only problem was that Syracuse was having one heck of a snowy December and was pulling away. By December 23rd, just a day or so after winter started Syracuse was already had half of their normal snow totals for the season.

I think the big news for December was Rochester had a record snowfall of 46.2 inches for the month of December, Syracuse received 57 inches of snow for it's 3rd snowiest December ever and the ice storm that hit several states with over 1,000,000 people without power including a lot in the Albany area.

January - Syracuse continued to hold a solid first place and also continued to add to their lead. Buffalo and Rochester in my opinion, at least at the time were still in the Golden Snowball race. Hey, winter just really began and we still had February and March left. Yeah! We'll get to March in a bit!

By about half way through January some of us in the Syracuse area were thinking maybe this was the season that the long sought after 200 inch mark could be accomplished. Syracuse getting closer to their annual snowfall with still a lot of winter to go. Buffalo managed to sneak past Rochester once again around Jan 19th and the battle for second place would go back and forth. In the mean time I think we were all starting to realize that it was looking like a 6 peat for Syracuse since the Golden Snowball contest was restarted up again. Still a lot of time left but Syracuse was pulling away and by the end of January had more than a 3 foot lead over second place. Things weren't looking good for Rochester or Buffalo.

I think the biggest news for January was that by the end of the month Syracuse already hit their annual snowfall totals which we updated here at goldensnowball.com to 121.1..

February - Same Ole, Same Ole! The battle for second place slid back and forth between Rochester and Buffalo and Syracuse continued to build on their lead. It came down to still being hopeful that Buffalo and Rochester would find a way to close the gap between them and Syracuse but as February slowly slipped by it was pretty much over. The New York snow contest for the 2008 - 2009 season was starting to be a blowout. What a difference a season makes as we think back to how close it was last season.

All in all February wasn't a bad month for snow. By the end of February Syracuse had a lead of almost 50 inches of snow. Punxsutawney Phil saw his shadow which means *cough* Cough* another 6 weeks of winter which brings us into March.

March - Enough Said :) Punxsutawney Phil Who?

At least that some of us have been having nice weather.

Last I knew Redfield still had snow on the ground but it could be gone after this last batch of hot weather and rain. I was reading an article by Michelle Breidenbach in the Post Standard about Redfield and Carol Yerdon who measures the snow in Redfield, NY a week or so ago, put the paper down and went and cut the grass. So far I've had to cut the lawn 3 times and there is no doubt in my mind that one of the best scents in the world is that first smell of fresh cut grass. Rates right up there with the smell of chocolate cookies in the oven ;) Anyways, for those of you missing winter already check out the article at http://www.syracuse.com/news/index.ssf/2009/04/anyone_who_thinks_they_got.html