Covid-19 and College Athletics

[jakejc795]

Cal Poly opts out of remainder of Spring season, reportedly due to injuries and senior opt outs until Fall 2021. They would have had only 49 players for this week's game against NAU and were slated to end Spring season against Weber State

Fall home opener will be against "Yotes

[jakejc795]

Sounds like JMU is down a handful of players against William & Mary, so outcome could be more interesting than oddsmakers suggested

[jakejc795]

UND at YSU postponed due to Covid protocols in UND program. The game will apparently be rescheduled for 4/17 in Youngstown.

[jakejc795]

Delaware (#12) at New Hampshire (#20) has been postponed due to Covid-related protocols in UNH program.

CAA will need to work some magic rescheduling this, as neither team has Saturday availability through 4/17, and playoffs are slated to begin 4/24.

Would be interesting to see if they'd bump game(s) either team may have against an unranked opponent between now and then to force two ranked teams to face each other and cull playoff field.

[jakejc795]

Report with additional details from JMU is now a dozen positive tests with 16 additional players quarantined due to contact with Covid-positive individuals, for a total of 28 individuals directly impacted (positive or quarantined).

[jakejc795]

JMU's 3/20 game vs. Richmond postponed due to their program's continued Covid issues. That's second consecutive game, and has resulted in JMU football activities being paused.

Have to wonder if their season continues, if decision would be made to make them ineligible for postseason, if they were to have third cancellation due to their program having positive Covid tests (rather than it being the opponent's program the next/third time) given risk they'd compromise playoffs

[jakejc795]

Idaho at NAU scheduled for Sat. is also postponed (with rescheduling TBD). This one's less consequential than JMU given Idaho's "ORV" status.

[jakejc795]

William & Mary vs. JMU game on Sat. postponed (with rescheduling decision to occur at later date) due to Covid protocols in JMU program

[jakejc795]

UNI's MBB team's season ended within a half hour of tip off due to positive Covid test for Panthers Tier I staff person.

Perhaps the crux of it all is the disconnect/miscommunication between St. Louis Board of Health officials at the tourney site and MVC Admin. regarding whose guidelines (CDC versus St. Louis Health Commissioner's) would be governing

[bigticket1]

COVID effects hit close to home as Minnesota announces that they are cutting men's tennis, men's gymnastics and men's track & field. Big Ten network $ apparently wasn't enough to keep everything afloat. I'm sure they probably have had to reduce advertising rates and have lost subscribers with no live events for 6 months, and nothing in sight for at least a couple more.

[Nidaros]

I have known Stig for 33 years. I was introduced to him at a gathering celebrating the hiring of Mike Daly. John was a very loyal assistant. His moral convictions are needed in the coaching profession as there is a great temptation to take short cuts. Not on John’s watch. I too am impressed with his answer to the question”Who would you like to see as your replacement? For continuity an assistant is what SDSU needs. If we look at our northern neighbor, NDSU, they are not into big changes but rather improving on what works and finding the student athletes to execute the plays that work. We will not be able to follow that path if we bring in some wiss-bang that is determined to change everything. NDSU is smart enough to not bite on that one. I suspect Eric Eidness and Clint Briown are ate the top of this list.

[jakejc795]

Sorry if I missed someone else posting this, but here's recent interview with Stig that some might find interesting.

In it, he and Lemonly co-founder/CEO (and Jacks fan) John Meyer discuss Stig's leadership practices/concepts, mentors, lessons learned, etc.

A couple football-specific items Stig mentions include possible Feb. 20 first "spring" home game (which I hadn't seen reported/mentioned elsewhere yet) and a preference that his eventual successor be coach who is on staff when Stig's tenure ends (which has been speculated by some on this forum)

[jakejc795]

A rather glaring omission from the list of "returning heavy hitters in the FCS" that are "out for the fall" in this article, particularly considering Illinois State and UNI being listed among Valley teams.

[jakejc795]

I think I mostly agree with you, but as a person in charge of a bunch of football players can you imagine what the backlash would be if some football players got Covid and died? The media would be on that narrative like white on rice.

They don't care to report on the thousands and thousands of people who have recovered because it doesn't generate clicks.

If only we could separate recovery from transmissibility. Again, regardless of that person's likelihood of recovery, s/he can infect others who might not recover or who may exhibit more severe symptoms or physiological damage.

Plus there's purportedly a more disturbing narrative in our region. If true, an undetermined number of CSU coaches are risking not only the health of players but also staff, faculty, and Ft. Collins' citizens by subverting contact tracing efforts.

Again, if true, one could reasonably foresee that coaches and admin. have an incentive to discourage potentially infected students from being tested, and were this to occur during the season, they'd be putting fellow conference foes at risk.

Hopefully CSU cleans house prior to the 2021 season when the Jacks are scheduled to play them.

[MontanaRabbit]

IMO if we are going to wait for 0% positive tests or a reliable tested vaccine we can just cancel everything for possibly years to come. Serious question here....are all positive tests necessarily a bad thing? The way to beat a virus is to build immunity to it so it can't be spread. It seems to me we are picking certain groups to test very often while the rest of the population is ignored. Why isn't every large business or corperation testing its employees daily? I'm sure many have a different opinion which I respect but. One thing for sure is I would not want to be the guy in charge of trying to keep a bunch of college age kids (or many adults) quarantined in a bubble for very long. Good luck with that.

I think I mostly agree with you, but as a person in charge of a bunch of football players can you imagine what the backlash would be if some football players got Covid and died? The media would be on that narrative like white on rice.

They don't care to report on the thousands and thousands of people who have recovered because it doesn't generate clicks.