Yesterday, two of the “Big Five” college football conferences announced that they were postponing their seasons . . . and that’s a HUGE blow to the NCAA.
The Big Ten voted to postpone all fall sports seasons, including football, with the hopes of playing in the spring. The Big Ten includes schools like Ohio State, Penn State, Michigan, Iowa, Illinois, Wisconsin, Nebraska, and Purdue.
Later, the Pac-12 followed suit . . . also nixing sports through the end of the year. The Pac-12 schools include: UCLA, USC, Oregon, Washington, Washington State, Arizona, Arizona State, and Stanford.
As for the other conferences, the ACC and SEC say their fall football plans remain unchanged . . . and the Big 12 is leaning toward playing this fall.
Outside of the Big Five, the Mid-American Conference and the Mountain West conference are also abandoning fall sports.
So, does this mean college football in 2020 is doomed? Not quite.
It’s possible for the remaining Big Five conferences to continue . . . the SEC previously switched to an all-conference schedule, and the ACC and Big 12 plan on playing a conference-only-plus-one schedule.
But with the Big Ten and Pac-12 out . . . it’s becoming increasingly difficult for the other conferences to justify playing.
Obviously, shutting down college sports isn’t ideal on a lot of fronts . . . but we’re STILL in the middle of a once-in-a-century pandemic, and the health ramifications of the virus are still being studied.
On the flip-side, others believe that America “needs” college sports right now, and they want to see it happen, regardless of the fallout.
Legendary college coach Lou Holtz is one of them. He compared the coronavirus to D-Day . . . quote, “When they stormed Normandy, they knew there were going to be casualties . . . there were going to be risks.” (Here’s video.)
But even if the NCAA shuts everything down this fall . . . then there are the complications of asking student-athletes to play TWO seasons in 2021, or to have them accept a lost season altogether.