TRAMEL'S TAKE
Small-college football programs are in danger this season, Berry Tramel writes
Keith Baxter made a couple of tough phone calls in March. NCAA Division II athletes want to play just as much as their bigger, stronger, faster brothers and sisters in Division I. Their thrill of victory and agony of a lost season is no less, just because they play in gymnasiums instead of coliseums, on games that are streamed instead of ESPN'd.
Baxter, the athletic director at Southeastern State University in Durant, had to pull the plug on his school's athletics back in March, when the coronavirus pandemic arrived to a nation largely unaware of its impact.
Baxter's phone calls meant his women's basketball team, about to take the court in Warrensburg, Missouri, for an NCAA regional opener, had no reason to leave the locker room. Meant his men's basketball team, en route to Maryville, Missouri, for its own NCAA regional, had to turn around the bus in Vian, on Interstate 40, to make the sad trip home.
Now Baxter knows he might soon have to deliver similar news in person. The athletic seasons for fall seem more and more unlikely on every level, but particularly in Division II, where concern for athletes, staff and coaches is just as high as in the NBA or the Big 12, but where resources are far scarcer.
“It's kind of like groundhog day a little bit,” Baxter said. “Been about the same conversation for the last three months. Just trying to make plans, trying to predict the future but don't know what that is looking like.”
Athletic disruption at Oklahoma's NCAA Division II schools has a massive effect on campuses. Southeastern State counts about 350 athletes among its enrollment of 4,800. Southwestern State has about 400 athletes, counting its rodeo team and cheer squads, in its enrollment of 4,400. Oklahoma Baptist University has about
550 athletes among its enrollment of 1,900.
“I think right now, the bulk of the administrators in D-II, they're throwing all kinds of stuff at the wall, seeing if something will stick,” said OBU athletic director Robert Davenport. “Find something that fits health and safety means, but at the same time allows kids to play.”
But with COVID-19 cases surging across America, that's becoming less and less likely. Four Division II conferences already have suspended all fall-semester athletics. Some lower-level Division I conferences, plus the National Junior College Athletic Association, have done the same.
The NBA has a bubble in Disney World; the Big Ten and Pac-12 have nine-figure athletic budgets and medical schools. But NBA commissioner Adam Silver isn't confident the league can finish its season, and the Big Ten and Pac-12 already have reduced their football schedules to conference games only.
How is Southwestern Oklahoma State, with a tiny fraction of those resources, going to get football off the ground?
“It's difficult for us,” said SWOSU interim athletic director Todd Helton, who played for the Bulldogs and has coached and worked at the school for almost three decades. “The mandates, the importance of our student-athletes' health, is just as paramount to us as it to the D-I.”
Social distancing would be a problem on the Division II level. Most schools don't have spacious locker rooms, weight rooms or meeting rooms. Most Division II schools have performed health screenings for athletes returning to campuses this summer. But the biggest challenge will be testing.
The costs of testing range widely. Some tests are as low as $25; some as high as $200. Some tests are more reliable. Some tests produce quicker results. The NBA will test daily. Major college football is talking about a couple of tests per week.
The NCAA has yet to mandate testing. The Division II council meets in late July, and many administrators expect mandatory testing to be required. But even testing every two weeks could be cost prohibitive.
“I think that's going to be a tipping point for Division II institutions,” Helton said. “Then you are talking about budgets. We have 400 athletes in the fall; that number would be tough for us to afford.”
OBU's Davenport is intrigued by Southern Arkansas University, which has purchased equipment to do in-house testing. Schools are doing all they can to have a semblance of a school year and an athletic season.
Division II football already has been reduced to a 10-game schedule. The 12-member Great American Conference, with six schools from Oklahoma and six from Arkansas; and the 14-member MidAmerica Intercollegiate Athletic Association, which includes Central Oklahoma, already play conference games only.
OBU's Davenport said of fall sports, “right now it's 50-50 we push it to spring,” but that is fraught with problems, too. While OU and OSU have massive athletic departments that conceivably could administer most sports clustered into March and April, the Division II schools have limited staffs. Chalking fields, running clocks, managing meets. Those things do not happen on their own.
Shortened schedules almost surely would result. And even a condensed schedule could cause a condensed schedule in autumn 2021, even if COVID-19 concerns are gone. For football, that's a short span in which to play a lot of games.
The pandemic doesn't directly threaten the budgets of Division II schools. Those effects are more long-term.
Division II athletics boost enrollment. In Shawnee, almost 30% of OBU's students compete in athletics. Davenport said he hopes the NCAA allows schools to continue practice in the fall, even if competition is delayed.
Helton, in Weatherford, points out that while Southwestern enrollment is down about 10% — students likely are waiting to see how the pandemic develops during the summer — the athletic numbers haven't changed. That's an indicator of athletes' commitment, and importance, to the school.
“I'd like to think they stay with us,” even if fall sports are delayed or canceled, Helton said. “We'll look at ways to keep them engaged. Hopefully we can hang onto those guys.”
Division II culture is different from most major-college sports. Student-athletes and non-athlete students mingle much more across campuses. Managing the virus is a school-wide issue, moreso than just an athletic issue, especially at a small campus.
Like at OBU, where Davenport has asked the question, “Why would we test athletes only?”
“The thing that kind of bothers me the most, you're in college for four years, and this is eating up a year of your college experience,” Davenport said. “We want to do everything we can do to make it as special as we can.”
And that's the point. The people who care about Southeastern or OBU or Southwestern are relatively small in number. But the people who care, notably the athletes themselves, care as much as anyone cares about their sport.
Berry Tramel: Berry can be reached at 405-7608080 or at btramel@oklahoman.com. He can be heard Monday through Friday from 4:40-5:20 p.m. on The Sports Animal radio network, including FM-98.1. You can also view his personality page at oklahoman. com/berrytramel.