SALT LAKE CITY — The Big Ten is reversing course and football will be back next month for the league.
The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel first reported Wednesday morning that the conference has approved a proposal to start its 2020 college football season in October, and each Big Ten team will play eight games during an eight-week window, according to ESPN, with a league championship game tentatively set for Dec. 19. That’s one day before the final College Football Playoff rankings are set to release.
The league later formally announced it will kick off the season the weekend of Oct. 23-24, while also outlining medical protocols, including “daily antigen testing, enhanced cardiac screening and an enhanced data-driven approach when making decisions about practice/competition.”
“Everyone associated with the Big Ten should be very proud of the groundbreaking steps that are now being taken to better protect the health and safety of the student-athletes and surrounding communities,” Dr. Jim Borchers, Ohio State head team physician and co-chair of the Return to Competition Task Force medical subcommittee, said in a statement.
“The data we are going to collect from testing and the cardiac registry will provide major contributions for all 14 Big Ten institutions as they study COVID-19 and attempt to mitigate the spread of the disease among wider communities.”
Daily testing will begin by Sept. 30, the Big Ten said, and a student-athlete who tests positive for COVID-19 must wait at least 21 days before returning to game competition.
The Big Ten announced Aug. 11 it would postpone all fall sports, including football, for its league members. The next day, the Pac-12 did as well.
What about the Pac-12?
This leaves the Pac-12 as the only Power Five conference not playing football this fall, along with two Group of Five conferences — the Mountain West and the Mid-American. On Monday, ESPN’s Heather Dinich reported that the Pac-12’s “most aggressive” plan to return to play would target a mid-to-late November start.
Following the Big Ten’s announcement Wednesday, the Pac-12 released a statement from commissioner Larry Scott that indicated the league’s universities in California and Oregon — UCLA, USC, Stanford, California, Oregon and Oregon State make up half of the league — didn’t have approval from public health officials to start contact practice. By late afternoon, though, the conference released another statement that detailed work had been done to alleviate those issues.
“The Pac-12 welcomes today’s statements by Governor (Gavin) Newsom of California and Governor (Kate) Brown of Oregon that state public health officials will allow for contact practice and return to competition, and that there are no state restrictions on our ability to play sports in light of our adherence to strict health and safety protocols and stringent testing requirements, including our recently announced partnership with Quidel which will enable daily rapid results testing,” Scott said in the statement. “We appreciate Governor Newsom’s and Governor Brown’s support, the former of which is consistent with the very productive conversation that he and I had earlier today.
“Our California and Oregon universities will now each individually and immediately reach out to their relevant county public health officials to seek clarification on what is required to achieve the same clearance to resume contact practice and competition. We are eager for our student-athletes to have the opportunity to play this season, as soon as it can be done and in accordance with public health authority approvals.”
Scott also addressed the wildfires happening right now across the west coast. “We are equally closely monitoring the devastating fires and air quality in our region at this time,” he said in the earlier statement.
On Sept. 3, the Pac-12 — which postponed league fall sports competitions through the end of the calendar year — announced it had partnered with Quidel Corporation, a diagnostics company with rapid COVID-19 testing that can produce results in 15 minutes. “This is a major step toward the safe resumption of Pac-12 sport competitions,” Scott said at the time.
Responses from Mountain West, Mid-American
The other two FBS conferences who have also postponed their fall sports, including football, shared statements following Wednesday’s Big Ten news.
A statement from Mountain West commissioner Craig Thompson emphasized the league’s diligence in finding solutions as soon as possible.
“Multiple subgroups within the conference are working daily on solutions to the existing challenges in order to facilitate a return to play for Mountain West football, and other conference sports programs, at the earliest possible opportunity. This includes finalizing a plan for frequent, rapid response testing and continuing to monitor the status of public health directives in our MW states and communities,” the statement read.
A statement from MAC commissioner Jon Steinbrecher reasserted the league’s stance it will pursue playing fall sports competitions in the spring.
“Currently there are no plans to play a fall season in any sport. We are focused on providing our fall student-athletes meaningful competitive experiences in the spring,” the statement read.