Trump joins fight to get Big Ten football running
MADISON – On the same day President Donald Trump spoke by phone to Big Ten commissioner Kevin Warren in an attempt get the league's teams back onto the football field immediately, coaches and athletic directors working behind the scenes intensified their efforts to play as soon as possible.
The key, several sources familiar with the talks reiterated Tuesday, will be convincing the Big Ten Council of Presidents and Chancellors to reverse its recent decision. The council voted, 11-3, last month to shut down all Big Ten fall sports because of concerns over the coronavirus pandemic.
Ohio State, Iowa and Nebraska voted to attempt to stick to the revised 10game schedule, which was supposed to begin this week.
Nine members of the council would have to vote in favor of a new plan to meet the 60% threshold required by the league's bylaws.
Big Ten coaches and athletic directors, who have been working on plans featuring start-ups around Thanksgiving and the first week of January, will also have to convince Warren that teams can return to practice and play games safely.
Warren, according to sources, was comfortable advocating for the shutdown that was announced on Aug. 11.
With the Southeastern Conference, Atlantic Coast Conference and Big 12 still on course to play this fall and the College Football Playoff still on schedule, frustration among Big Ten coaches and athletic directors has been growing exponentially.
Ohio State has been leading the charge to play in 2020, largely because head coach Ryan Day and athletic director Gene Smith believe the Buckeyes are capable of competing for a national title
this season. If the Big Ten waits until Thanksgiving or the first week of January those hopes will be dashed.
Convincing the Big Ten Council of Presidents and Chancellors to reverse course will not be easy, particularly considering recent developments at Iowa. School officials announced on Monday that of the 815 tests taken last week, 93 were positive tests. That is a rate of 11.4%.
Communication issues that plagued the Big Ten since Aug. 11, when the league offered only vague reasons for the shutdown, complicate the situation.
Trump tweeted before leaving for Kenosha that he had a productive conversation with Warren about immediately restarting preparation for the Big Ten’s 2020 football season.
“Would be good (great!) for everyone – Players, Fans, Country," he wrote. “On the one yard line.”
Whether the league’s coaches and athletic directors can make a successful push remains to be seen.
To review:
The Big Ten announced its revised 2020 football schedule on Aug. 5, along with detailed medical protocols to help ensure the safety of athletes. Each team was scheduled to play 10 games, six within the division and four crossover games.
Six days later, the league announced it was shutting down football and all other fall sports. League officials released an eight-paragraph statement explaining the decision and Warren appeared on the Big Ten Network to answer questions.
With Warren out of the public eye for almost a week, fans from Ohio State, Penn State, Nebraska and Iowa released letters demanding transparency. Ohio State quarterback Justin Fields started a petition on Aug. 16 requesting the league reverse its decision. More than 250,000 people joined the petition by the next day. Questions lingered about whether the Big Ten Council of Presidents and Chancellors had voted on the matter or if Warren alone pulled the plug on fall sports.
On Aug. 19, Warren released a more detailed explanation of the league’s decision to shut down fall sports and noted the decision would not be revisited.
Parents from several schools were not satisfied, and a group of eight Nebraska football players filed a lawsuit on Aug. 27 seeking a reversal of the league’s decision to shut down the 2020 season.
In responding to the lawsuit, the Big Ten revealed the Council of Presidents and Chancellors voted, 11-3, to postpone the 2020 season.
The league has assembled a Return to Competition Task Force to study how to get football up and running. That task force includes head coaches, athletic directors members of the Council of Presidents and Chancellors and university medical personnel.
The Big Ten reiterated its stance Tuesday:
"The Big Ten Conference and its Return to Competition Task Force, on behalf of the Big Ten Council of Presidents and Chancellors (COP/C), are exhausting every resource to help studentathletes get back to playing the sports they love, at the appropriate time, in the safest and healthiest way possible."