The ACC will delay the start of competition for all fall sports until at least Sept. 1

Techster

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SEC-centric, but point is if football is played, annual rivalries and big interconference games will probably be played.

 

MidtownJacket

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NC is one of the states doing pretty well and things are getting crazy bad here. Portland State can sue to their heart's content, but try to get a P5 deal in the future if they win. This is chaos right now.
Yeah, it will be interesting to say the least. If you start biting the hand that feeds you, odds are you stop getting fed. Having said that, for some of these programs a game with a P5 may contribute enough to their budget that they can't weather no money coming.. This is going to have a larger impact than I think people are ready for on college sports. Just recently Stanford, Dartmouth and Brown have cut something like 20 D1 teams among the group. Things like Lax and Fencing, Crew and Tennis or other sporting endeavors that don't have Big $$ or work to balance Title IX balancing for Men's FBall are going to be in trouble.
 

RamblinRed

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Good articles from SI - basically everyone is waiting for the SEC to see what it does. Also if a decision is made not to start the season on time, that doesn't mean it is not going to be played. Just means they will postpone and continue to watch to see if they can start playing at some point. First article also talks about the 3 options that had the most traction at the SEC AD meeting on Monday.



**--The SEC has 2-3 weeks until it MUST make a decision on the start of the 2020 college football season.

**--The SEC is going to take every minute of that time to monitor the numbers, talk to the medical experts, and gather the best possible data.

**--In order for the SEC to start the season on Sept. 5 as planned, things are going to have to get better. The infection numbers have to be trending down. There has to be consistent testing and the state of the overall health care system has to be good.
 

bobongo

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You could have a full season, but without the fans. Test all the players to cut down on the chance anyone on the field could be infected. The home team could just pipe in the fan noise (I'll bet we'd screw that up royally). I'm not advocating this, but just saying...

A football game without fans would be a weird spectacle, though.

One problem might be the slow turnaround of test results we're seeing now because there aren't enough labs to handle it. People are waiting 10 - 14 days in some cases. Also, players are going to need frequent tests, which may mean some others won't get tested. That won't be good, and it won't look good.
 

Techster

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One problem might be the slow turnaround of test results we're seeing now because there aren't enough labs to handle it. People are waiting 10 - 14 days in some cases. Also, players are going to need frequent tests, which may mean some others won't get tested. That won't be good, and it won't look good.

I forget which professional team it was, but the cost of their daily tests, facemasks/gloves, and sanitizing equipment and common areas was running them over $100K a month. That's with less players and personnel than college teams.

I can't imagine how that's financially feasible for most college teams given revenue is taking a massive hit already.

EDIT: It was a COLLEGE team. I can't imagine Tulane can keep this up financially:

 

ncjacket79

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One problem might be the slow turnaround of test results we're seeing now because there aren't enough labs to handle it. People are waiting 10 - 14 days in some cases. Also, players are going to need frequent tests, which may mean some others won't get tested. That won't be good, and it won't look good.
There are also shortages beginning to crop up for testing supplies again.
 

Techster

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There are also shortages beginning to crop up for testing supplies again.

Frustrating when you consider that we went through this a couple of months ago with testing and PPEs, and now we're about to go through it again.

The saying, "Those who fail to learn from the past are doomed to repeat it" goes through my mind right now. Abililty to get tests and have results back in a reasonable time should be the baseline.
 

Gtbowhunter90

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it begs the question, if they are going this far to test athletes then how are big institutions going to monitor the virus within the student body? You gonna test everybody?? Put barriers between every desk?
 

RamblinRed

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Someting else to keep an eye on.

This comment by an Athens-Clarke Co commissioner. If hospitals in areas where universities are located are filled with patients already, it makes it more difficult to play football (certainly with fans) given that is likely to lead to higher case loads

"Russell Edwards, an Athens-Clarke Commissioner, said Wednesday that local hospitals were unable to accept new patients because they were so overwhelmed by new cases of the disease. "
 

RamblinRed

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Frustrating when you consider that we went through this a couple of months ago with testing and PPEs, and now we're about to go through it again.

The saying, "Those who fail to learn from the past are doomed to repeat it" goes through my mind right now. Abililty to get tests and have results back in a reasonable time should be the baseline.

Unfortunately yeah. Was reading an article from Louisiana this morning where they were talking about running short of testing supplies and that by early in the morning testing sites were already running out. Also mentioned that testing is backed up so bad that in some cases in can 10 days to get results. One doctor was quoted as saying "we are pretty much back to where we were in March."

as we've already seen from the MLB (who hasn't even played a game yet), if you can't get the testing done quickly it negatively impacts the ability to have games.
 

bobongo

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Unfortunately yeah. Was reading an article from Louisiana this morning where they were talking about running short of testing supplies and that by early in the morning testing sites were already running out. Also mentioned that testing is backed up so bad that in some cases in can 10 days to get results. One doctor was quoted as saying "we are pretty much back to where we were in March."

as we've already seen from the MLB (who hasn't even played a game yet), if you can't get the testing done quickly it negatively impacts the ability to have games.

Could have crushed the curve and played football this fall (not to mention the lives that could have been saved), but we didn't so we won't.
 

bobongo

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Someting else to keep an eye on.

This comment by an Athens-Clarke Co commissioner. If hospitals in areas where universities are located are filled with patients already, it makes it more difficult to play football (certainly with fans) given that is likely to lead to higher case loads

"Russell Edwards, an Athens-Clarke Commissioner, said Wednesday that local hospitals were unable to accept new patients because they were so overwhelmed by new cases of the disease. "

There are seventeen counties that depend primarily on Athens hospitals. It would be interesting to see where the patients are being transferred to.

Atlanta? I think Grady is on overload right now.
 

RamblinRed

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SI.com has a draft document of the COVID Protocol for college sports.

College teams will be required to test football players within 72 hours of games using the standard PCR test. Game officials in football and basketball should also be tested weekly, because of their close contact with athletes, the document says. The document, however, does not require tests for coaches, though staff members must wear a mask on the sideline if they are not tested in the same way athletes are. As for other high-risk sports, athletes should be tested within 72 hours of the first game of a week’s set of games.


Those who test positive must isolate for at least 10 days from their onset of symptoms/positive test and until they’ve gone at least three days without symptoms, which the document defines as “resolution of fever without the use of fever-reducing medications and improvement of respiratory symptoms (e.g., cough, shortness of breath).” Those found to have had “high risk” contact with people who have tested positive will quarantine for 14 days. This 14-day quarantine is mandatory. Even if those quarantined test negative for the virus, they must still complete the 14 days without competition—a significant restriction that could knock out large swaths of a football team. “Institutions may consider testing contacts during quarantine if the local testing supply is adequate, however this does not shorten or remove the need for a 14 day quarantine period,” the document says.

A “high risk” contact is defined as those who are within six feet of an infected person for at least 15 minutes while one or both parties is not wearing a mask. That includes anyone participating in face-to-face or contact drills against each other.

If an athlete or staff member becomes symptomatic between testing and competition, they should be isolated. If athletes develop symptoms during competition, they should be isolated and that information should be shared with the current opponent to assist in decisions about how to proceed with that competition,

The document details several conditions that would result in a school discontinuing competition and/or complete seasons: 1) lack of ability to isolate new positive cases or quarantine high-contact risk cases on campus; 2) inability to perform weekly testing; 3) campus-wide or local community test rates that are considered unsafe by local public health officials; 4) inability to perform adequate contact tracing; 5) local public health officials state that there is an inability for the hospital infrastructure to accommodate a surge in COVID-related hospitalizations.

Nos. 3 and 5 are a great concern for athletic administrators.
SEC commissioner Greg Sankey noted these issues Monday in an interview on the Paul Finebaum Show. It's not about the death rate or the illness' impact on young people—it's about overwhelmed public health departments. “We need to see the ability for our hospitals and health care systems to manage what’s happening with COVID-19,” Sankey says.
 

bobongo

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SI.com has a draft document of the COVID Protocol for college sports.

College teams will be required to test football players within 72 hours of games using the standard PCR test. Game officials in football and basketball should also be tested weekly, because of their close contact with athletes, the document says. The document, however, does not require tests for coaches, though staff members must wear a mask on the sideline if they are not tested in the same way athletes are. As for other high-risk sports, athletes should be tested within 72 hours of the first game of a week’s set of games.


Those who test positive must isolate for at least 10 days from their onset of symptoms/positive test and until they’ve gone at least three days without symptoms, which the document defines as “resolution of fever without the use of fever-reducing medications and improvement of respiratory symptoms (e.g., cough, shortness of breath).” Those found to have had “high risk” contact with people who have tested positive will quarantine for 14 days. This 14-day quarantine is mandatory. Even if those quarantined test negative for the virus, they must still complete the 14 days without competition—a significant restriction that could knock out large swaths of a football team. “Institutions may consider testing contacts during quarantine if the local testing supply is adequate, however this does not shorten or remove the need for a 14 day quarantine period,” the document says.

A “high risk” contact is defined as those who are within six feet of an infected person for at least 15 minutes while one or both parties is not wearing a mask. That includes anyone participating in face-to-face or contact drills against each other.

If an athlete or staff member becomes symptomatic between testing and competition, they should be isolated. If athletes develop symptoms during competition, they should be isolated and that information should be shared with the current opponent to assist in decisions about how to proceed with that competition,

The document details several conditions that would result in a school discontinuing competition and/or complete seasons: 1) lack of ability to isolate new positive cases or quarantine high-contact risk cases on campus; 2) inability to perform weekly testing; 3) campus-wide or local community test rates that are considered unsafe by local public health officials; 4) inability to perform adequate contact tracing; 5) local public health officials state that there is an inability for the hospital infrastructure to accommodate a surge in COVID-related hospitalizations.

Nos. 3 and 5 are a great concern for athletic administrators.
SEC commissioner Greg Sankey noted these issues Monday in an interview on the Paul Finebaum Show. It's not about the death rate or the illness' impact on young people—it's about overwhelmed public health departments. “We need to see the ability for our hospitals and health care systems to manage what’s happening with COVID-19,” Sankey says.

Well suffice it to say that if the season were scheduled to kick off today, it wouldn't.
 
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