Nearly every industry in the U.S. has been affected in someway by the COVID-19 pandemic, and sports are no exception.
Professional leagues, such as the NBA, MLB and NHL, were suspended until further notice. Spring collegiate sports were also cancelled as a result, such as baseball and softball.
While the NBA, MLB, and NHL have come to agreements on ways to resume their respective seasons, collegiate sports are still trying to figure out how to move forward without risking the safety of players, coaches and staff.
Recently, college football has been in the news for how a few conferences are going to resume play in the Fall. So far, the Ivy League, Big Ten and Pac-12 conferences have decided to alter their schedules.
The Ivy League, which consists of Princeton, Harvard, Columbia, Yale, Pennsylvania, Dartmouth, Brown and Cornell, came out swinging first. On July 8, the League ruled out all fall sports in 2020 due to the pandemic. They were the first Division I conference to decide to suspend sports for the fall, according to ESPN.
Shortly afterward, the Big Ten (Indiana, Maryland, Michigan, Michigan State, Ohio State, Penn State, Rutgers, Illinois, Minnesota, Iowa, Nebraska, Northwestern, Purdue and Wisconsin) and Pac-12 (Arizona, Arizona State, California – Berkeley, California – Los Angeles, Colorado – Boulder, Oregon, Oregon State, Southern California, Stanford, Utah, Washington, Washington State) conferences opted to hold conference-only schedules.
As a dedicated sports fan and sports writer, I like the idea of sports continuing in any sort of fashion as opposed to further lockdowns.
The safety of all players, coaches, staff and fans should be top priority of all levels of competition. I can’t fault the Ivy league for their decision, since they’re concentrated in major population centers in the Northeast.
However, unlike some other schools, believe that Ivy League schools are very dependent on sports to generate money. It’s no secret that some colleges and universities depend on sports as either a financial crutch or a major source of revenue.
Having a conference-only schedule would mitigate travel as much as possible at the expense of some interesting matchups. But what does this mean for college sports in Tennessee?
The three big dogs of college football in the state – Tennessee, Vanderbilt and Memphis – aren’t members of either the Big Ten or Pac-12, and thus are not yet certain about their schedules moving forward.
UTM, a member of the Ohio Valley Conference (OVC), only plays about 2-3 non-conference games a year, with one typically being a smackdown by a Power Five school. A conference-only schedule wouldn’t have a huge impact on UTM’s football schedule.
Unfortunately, COVID-19 is still very prominent in the U.S. and will likely have an affect on every fall collegiate sport. I support the measures taken by the Pac-12 and Big Ten, as even limited football is better than none at all.
