COVID in control
Sports could be altered again as second wave rolls in
When the Ivy League became the first NCAA Division I conference to cancel the rest of its winter season in March — hard on the heels of the first COVID cases of NBA players Rudy Gobert and Donovan Mitchell — the rest of college athletics quickly followed. So did the pros.
The fear of the disease was great. The fear of the unknown was greater. If the smartest people in the world decided it was unsafe to play, why in the name of science would we defy them?
Yet when the Ivy League again got out in front of the pack in early July and canceled its fall season, so many, football especially, did not go along. The COVID numbers were going down and restrictions were being relaxed. Besides, cynics said, the eggheads don’t value athletics like the rest of us and they have multibilliondollar endowments to keep them going until the 22nd century. Even the prestigious schools in the Big Ten and Pac-12, which initially decided not to play football, reversed course.
Which brings us to this weekend, eight months into this godforsaken plague and only hours after the Ivy League again became the first in Division I to call off its winter sports season. We put on our mask. We check the metrics. We sharpen our
moral vision. We throw open the front window and scream:
“What the hell are we going to do now?”
The colder weather has arrived and, as projected, so has the ugly resurgence of COVID. We are back on the path of breaking daily records. On Friday alone, there were 184,514 new cases and that pushes the total to 10.8 million in the U.S. Essentially, the state of Georgia has tested positive. While advancements in treatment have brought down the death rate, the raw numbers are on the rise again and 245,000 of us already have perished. In some states, like South Dakota where positivity rates are 50 percent, the spread is beyond alarming.
Yes, sports is back in a chaotic state.
Until a vaccine is approved and distributed, these are our darkest days. And unless you hold professional athletes as handsomely paid hostages in a bubble for three months, there is no surefire solution.
“My brother Bill, the cardiologist, is right,” Jim Calhoun said. “He says, “You guys keep talking, but you know who’s going to control this whole thing? The virus.’ ”
There were 49 major college football games scheduled Saturday. Fifteen — 31 percent — were either postponed or canceled because of COVID. Ohio StateMaryland, canceled. Arizona State coach Herm Edwards was among the positive tests that caused the Sun Devils’ game with Cal to be canceled. Four postponements were in the SEC, King Football, leaving Commissioner Greg Sankey to say “I’m certainly shaken, but not deterred.”
The war for the almighty dollar must go on undeterred, right? In 2020 alone, the national TV networks are on the hook for $1.4 billion, and that doesn’t include the College Football Playoff or the conference networks. TV needs content. Schools that run the cartel outside the NCAA’s grasp of power need cash. Yet even a Power Five president told Pete Thamel of Yahoo Sports, “It’s going to be hard to finish (the season), to be honest. The next couple weeks are going to be tricky.”
A more sobering argument than greed, however, may be survival. A second year without the nearly $1 billion from March Madness could threaten the very existence of the NCAA. Sure, men’s basketball would rebound quickly, but all the other sports in the various divisions? These are dangerous times.
Yes, we had a little moment this weekend that made us smile. Division III Coast Guard, able to play its one-game football season at Merchant Marine on Saturday, became the only Connecticut college at any level to compete in 2020.
The harder truth now is that Yale basketball and hockey are gone just like Yale football and UConn football were gone.
The UConn men’s basketball opener is supposed to be Nov. 25 — only a week and a half away — against Central Connecticut at Gampel, but nothing is official. The Huskies are still under quarantine after a positive COVID test.
Checking in with Quinnipiac hockey coach Rand Pecknold on Saturday, his program is dealing with the loss of half the league without the Ivies. The ECAC announced plans to still play. Pecknold said he’s hopeful to start Nov. 24, and QU’s schedule will include nonconference games. Check back in three to five days, he texted, he might have more news.
Sacred Heart basketball coach Anthony Latina confirmed his team is paused until Tuesday after a Tier I positive test and will have one week of practice before a tall order of an opener: No. 24 Rutgers. Quinnipiac basketball has just returned to the court for workouts the past few days.
That’s the way it is now. Plan on the fly. Adjust to a pause. Flexibility is the order of the day.
“Glad the Ivy League finally came to a decision on the season and appreciate them keeping our health and safety in mind,” Yale’s Paul Atkinson, last season’s coIvy League Player of the Year, tweeted. “However, the buildup to the announcement was handled poorly by both the league and our athletic department due to their terrible communication with student athletes.”
Atkinson plans to play elsewhere as a graduate transfer after he gets his degree this spring.
The Ivy League’s principled stand on COVID, the heartbreak of her studentathletes and Atkinson’s assertions all are worthy discussions with Yale AD Vicky Chun. I have been unable to get in contact with her for three days.
So many sports figures, too many to list, have had COVID. Some were asymptomatic. Some died. Yet when that list includes Cristiano Ronaldo, Trevor Lawrence, Patrick Ewing, Ezekiel Elliott, Tom Seaver, Cam Newton, Novak Djokovic and Kevin Durant, clearly no one, despite being athletic royalty, is immune. The great WWE Hall of Famer in the White House is proof positive.
Public health officials who can be trusted — I don’t believe a word Donald Trump is selling anymore — say the best-case scenario is for Pfizer’s vaccine to get FDA approval by the end of December and for doses to be shipped to states in late January.
Rick Pitino, whose Iona program has gone into quarantine, tweeted Saturday: “Save the Season. Move the start back. Play league schedule and have May Madness. Spiking and protocols make it impossible to play right now.”
My urge is to immediately agree, but I give up on predicting COVID. The 11 days (Nov. 25-Dec. 11) of 45 games and 40 teams in “Bubbleville” at Mohegan Sun certainly would furnish evidence whether the temporary single-site event could work safely.
Yet as Stadium’s Jeff Goodman points out, 20 programs are currently shut down (one mid-major for 52 days) and several more already have been. You start playing games, allow players home for Thanksgiving and/or Christmas, and who knows how many more will come back with COVID? This isn’t football. The full basketball team pauses 14 days. Pushing a conferenceonly schedule to late February, March and April and the NCAA Tournament to May does make some sense. You might even be able to slip in some area nonconference games.
Division III GNAC and NESCAC have shut down league games, but Calhoun plans to play nonconference games at St. Joe’s as early as mid-January. So does Mitch Oliver at Albertus Magnus. The hope is to get enough state and nearby schools to play sufficient games to qualify for the DIII national tournament. Calhoun is even looking at DII and DI opponents.
Without central leadership, college football is looking at a mess. With delayed season starts and ensuing cancellations, teams with varying records will argue for a berth in the CFP. Players will start opting out to prepare for the NFL draft. Pushing back the playoff does make sense, yet unlike basketball, which could conceivably hold off to May, football may be stuck in the darkest days of the winter’s worst hit before a vaccine can take hold or matters improve.
COVID is unforgiving. It kills us. It makes fools of us. Here was Notre Dame President John Jenkins chastising students for charging the field last weekend after the victory over No. 1 Clemson. The same John Jenkins who tested positive after attending the SCOTUS nomination ceremony for Amy Coney Barrett at the White House without a mask or social distancing. How do you spell hypocrite in Latin? And there was Florida coach Dan Mullen testing positive for COVID only days after proclaiming The Swamp should be allowed to be filled to capacity — not the allowable 20 percent — for a game.
Calhoun’s brother Bill is right. COVID calls the shots. We can only hope that the powers of college sports will put the health of unpaid athletes before the almighty buck. No matter how great the pressure.