Sari, we had the same kind of spring here - cold and very dry. The porcelains are always the best for me, just leaping out of the ground as soon as the snow was off them - very late! I often don't have to water the garlic at all, or only once or twice in a season, but everything has been extremely dry (just got rain at last yesterday).
I had quite a lot of losses in the fall planted bulbils especially, which I blamed on insufficient drainage as I saw the containers were jammed with ice and flooded late winter and the ground didn't thaw quickly enough for them to recover. Also even my bed of porcelain rounds, I have only 42 of 76 surviving. And lost about a third of my New York White. So... I guess it's a tough call sometimes, whether spring or fall planting will suffer the most.
Your field tells a story though, about spring vs fall in a dry season. At least those fall plants got the benefit of the snow.
