MORGANTOWN, W.Va. — Bob Bowlsby has heard the question. Frankly, it is the dominant question in all corners of collegiate athletics right now.
The trouble is, the question of whether or not the 2020 college football season will start on time involves so many variables that an answer is a long way off less than four months before games are scheduled to be played.
The Big 12 Conference commissioner has spent four decades as an administrator in college sports and he says the COVID-19 pandemic is unlike most issues that will have a defined beginning, middle and end.
“You really don’t see the end of it in sight,” Bowlsby said. “The virus is going to be around and with us for a while. We are going to have to learn to coexist.”
Bowlsby has been in communication with West Virginia state officials and WVU medical personnel. While the Big 12 office, school presidents and athletic directors are assessing various scenarios for what the 2020 football season could look like, ultimately the Big 12 may not have the final call on how to proceed.
“In the end, it is going to be governor’s offices and public health officials that tell university leaders that it is safe to come back.
“The next sixty days are really critical for us. If we aren’t practicing by the middle of July in football or anything else, it is going to be hard to start on time.”
.@BobBowlsby speaks with @TonyCaridi, @BradHowe07, and @HunterWvu88bgn about where the Big 12 Conference stands on playing fall sports. WATCH: https://t.co/wkudfIRZCB pic.twitter.com/OaBpTcaEAq
— MetroNews (@WVMetroNews) May 7, 2020
In an interview on Thursday’s Citynet Statewide Sportsline, Bowlsby seemed to echo the ‘return-to-play’ model that many college football coaches have spoken of in recent weeks. A six-week window of in-person instruction may be utilized with players returning to campus in mid-July.
“We need a couple weeks of acclimation in the sport of football for kids that haven’t been on campus and training at the level they might have been previously. And we need something close to four weeks for preseason camp to get ready.”
The potential ripple effect of a disruption to the football season would certainly have damaging effects on other sports throughout college programs.
“The biggest reason football has to be a high priority for us is because of the revenue it drives. It not only drives the bulk of the media revenue but it drives the bulk of the gate receipt revenue as well.
“Absent that revenue, it may be difficult to have other sports competing at the same level that they are used to because it is going to be difficult to fund those things.”
Schools around the country are likely considering the option of beginning the fall semester with exclusively online classes if health officials advise against having students return to campus. Bowlsby says that classes must be in session for student-athletes to compete but online classes would meet that standard.
“School has to be in session because football players on college teams are student-athletes. You have to be going to college. That doesn’t necessarily mean that if the new normal becomes online education, in part or in whole, that football players or volleyball players or soccer players couldn’t be taking classes online just like the rest of the students.
“I suspect some institutions may be a hundred percent online. And if they are, and if that is also what student-athletes are doing, I think that meets the criteria.”
Bowlsby speaks on an almost daily basis with commissioners from the other ‘Power 5’ conferences.
“We spend a lot of time collaborating with one another. Ideally, we would like to go forward together.
“We have to be flexible because we are going to encounter positive tests that are going to be disruptive.”
Even if the college football season starts on time and is uninterrupted by potential spikes in virus cases, Bowlsby anticipates attendance could be adversely impacted.
“If there are going to be fans in the stands, I don’t know if they are going to want to sit cheek by jowl next to somebody they don’t know. You would have to expect that maybe the crowds would be a little bit soft, especially early in the season.”