San Jose State, Mountain West cancel fall football season.
It becomes the second FBS conference to delay football to 2021
The Mountain West Conference, home to San Jose State, has become the second FBS conference to postpone its football season, punting on the fall with an eye toward playing in the spring.
The Mountain West announced Monday the indefinite postponement of all scheduled fall sports contests and MW championship events in response to ongoing challenges with the COVID-19 pandemic. In a release from the conference, the board announced fall sports affected by the decision include men’s and women’s cross country, football, women’s soccer and women’s volleyball.
“Nothing is more important than the health and well-being of our students, student-athletes, coaches, faculty, staff and overall communities,” Dr. Mary Papazian, president at San Jose State University and Chair of the MW Board of Directors said in the MW statement. “Through the hard work of many over the past several months, the conference made every effort to create an opportunity for our student-athletes to compete, and we empathize with the disappointment this creates for everyone associated with our programs. The best interests of our students and student-athletes remain our focus and we will persist in our efforts to forge a viable and responsible path forward.”
Now the 12-team Mountain West, which includes San Jose State, Boise State, Air Force, San Diego State and others, joins the
Mid-American Conference as leagues from the highest tier of NCAA Division I football to bail on the fall season and hope to make a go of it in the spring.
“Since the start of the pandemic, our membership and staff have been working diligently to prepare for a fall sports season,” Mountain West commissioner Craig Thompson said in the statement. “We were hopeful we could carefully and responsibly conduct competition as originally scheduled with essential protocols in place. However, numerous exter
nal factors and unknowns outside our control made this difficult decision necessary.”
The conference will consider options for bringing the sports back in the spring.
“For the sports that have been postponed, we will continue to plan for a number of future scenarios, and look forward to additional guidance from our governor, county officials and the NCAA,” San Jose State athletic director Marie Tuite said in the statement.
The Mountain West’s decision comes less than a week after it announced plans to play an eight-game conference football season and allow its members to pursue two nonconference games. That news was met with optimism that perhaps college football would be played this fall.
Within 48 hours, the mood had changed again.
The California Department of Public Health issued COVID-19 guidelines for institutions of higher education.
Included in he guidelines was that spectators would not be allowed at games.
In other college football news Monday:
• Old Dominion became the first school in the Bowl Subdivison to break from its league in canceling football.; the rest of Conference USA was going forward with plans to play.
President John Broderick made the announcement Monday, saying he knows student-athletes and fans will be disappointed, but playing “posed too great a risk.”
Old Dominion, under first-year coach Ricky Rahne, joins the 12-team
Mid-American Conference and Connecticut as Football Bowl Subdivision schools that have decided not to compete in football. Field hockey, men’s and women’s soccer and the Monarchs’ first volleyball team also won’t compete.
• Michigan coach Jim Harbaugh took a different stand, saying the Wolverines have shown players can be safe after they return to school.
“I’m not advocating for football this fall because of my passion or our players desire to play but because of the facts accumulated over the last eight weeks since our players returned to campus on June 13,” he wrote. “I am advocating on August 10 that this virus can be controlled and handled because of these facts.”
• SEC commissioner Greg Sankey has weighed in on the powerhouse league’s situation regarding a decision on the football season.
Sankey posted on Twitter he doesn’t know if college football can be played during the COVID-19 pandemic. He said the best advice he has received since the pandemic started was to be patient in making decisions. “This is all new & you’ll gain better information each day,” Sankey posted.