SEC media days to occur virtually

FAYETTEVILLE — The SEC announced Wednesday that the annual SEC football media days scheduled to take place in Atlanta next month will be held virtually.

The four-day affair, in which the head coaches and three players from each of the 14 SEC teams meet with up to 1,000 media members, had been scheduled for July 13-16 at the College Football Hall of Fame and Omni Hotel in downtown Atlanta. The dates and times for the virtual media days were not announced.

The coronavirus pandemic has temporarily shuttered the hall — a $68 million facility that opened in August 2014 after relocating from South Bend, Ind. — since March 16.

“Conducting football media days in a virtual format will provide us the opportunity to manage the event in a healthy manner as we continue to be impacted by covid-19, and will provide flexibility for our programs to adjust their preparation for the 2020 football season according to the preseason calendar that is expected to be expanded due to the cancellation of the spring football season,” SEC Commissioner Greg Sankey said in a statement. “We look forward to returning to our traditional media days format in 2021.”

SEC media days were held in Atlanta in 2018, the first time since 1985 they were conducted anywhere other than in metro Birmingham, Ala. The event went back to Hoover, Ala., in 2019.

SEC media days are scheduled to take place in Nashville, Tenn., in 2021, as Sankey has announced plans to move the event around in the SEC’s footprint, with locales such as

Houston, St. Louis, Memphis and others seen as possible host cities.

College Football Hall of Fame officials had been contemplating plans to reopen the facility for tourism before protests on May 29 turned violent as rioters broke exterior windows and looted items from the hall’s gift shop.

Other buildings in downtown Atlanta were also damaged, including an adjoining Chick-fil-A restaurant and the offices of CNN one block away.

College Football Hall of Fame CEO Kimberly Beaudin told the Atlanta Business Chronicle that the damage was limited.

“The museum itself was not breached, so we’re really thankful,” she told the publication.

Officials said none of the museum’s valuable artifacts or memorabilia was stolen or damaged, and that items were moved out of the building for safe keeping.

Arkansas Coach Sam Pittman is one of four new SEC head coaches who will make his media days debut, along with Ole Miss’ Lane Kiffin, Mississippi State’s Mike Leach and Missouri’s Eliah Drinkwitz. Arkansas Athletic Director Hunter Yurachek’s three-man search team interviewed all four of those coaches in December.

The Razorbacks had not announced which three players would have attended media days.

It is not known whether the virtual format will affect the number of participating players.

On the old schedule, Pittman and the Razorbacks were set to appear on Wednesday, July 15, on the same day as Alabama Coach Nick Saban, Tennessee Coach Jeremy Pruitt and Leach.