Following today’s Council of Presidents meeting, the Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference (MAAC) has decided to cancel fall sports competition due to continuing health and safety concerns surrounding the global COVID-19 pandemic. A decision on whether fall sport competition would be feasible in the spring will be determined by the presidents at a later date. Athletically related activities and training opportunities for enrolled student-athletes will be structured in accordance with each institution’s procedures and applicable state regulations.
MAAC Commissioner Rich Ensor notes that, “The fall sports impacted by the Council’s decision include men’s and women’s soccer, women’s volleyball, and men’s and women’s cross country and sports that conduct non-traditional season segments in the fall. The MAAC Executive Committee will explore with the Committee on Athletic Administration (COAA) the goal of providing the student-athletes with aschedule of contests among conference members in the spring of 2021 in accordance with each institution’s procedures and applicable state regulations. It is the goal of the MAAC to ensure it recognizes a MAAC champion in each sport and it will review possible championship formats for the fall sports in accordance with evolving state and local regulations.”
With vaccines and therapeutics, you have a chance of a spring season. Glad the option is open and won’t be surprised if it ends up the same way for basketball.
Personally I think this reaction is an over reaction. I think the fall sports (football aside) can be managed safely. However, I admit my reaction to the announcement is an emotional response. So I defer to the judgement of what I am sure is a group of knowledgeable people about what is best for their communities.
Personally I think this reaction is an over reaction. I think the fall sports (football aside) can be managed safely. However, I admit my reaction to the announcement is an emotional response. So I defer to the judgement of what I am sure is a group of knowledgeable people about what is best for their communities.
Unfortunately, we are not having a rational discussion in this country about corona virus. There are people positioning themselves politically on this topic. There are drug companies vying for revenue putting out false information. There are way too many people with agenda's. The schools and league officials are in a difficult position because they are getting bombarded with misinformation and propaganda. They want to err on the side of safety, as most rational people would. No one wants to see any unnecessary deaths. So the schools are rightfully being cautious.
But when you look outside the US, you have to question what we are doing. You have 3rd world nations like Turkey and South Korea that have achieved a mortality rate with Corona Virus 10 times lower than we have in the US and western world, and in fact lower than we have with the flu by using cheap inexpensive drugs that already exist. Yet we want to cancel life in America rather than use these drugs that have been on the market for more than 50 years. The fact that this is not even being discussed in the US is a story in itself.
Its hard to defer to the judgement of "knowledgeable" people on this topic, because even the medical experts are in great disagreement. So the schools have tough decisions to make and will likely err on the side of caution. If they play out the major league season with no one dying of covid, it starts to make a case that life can go on for athletes. It will be interesting to see how the marlins covid outbreak is handled by the MLB and plays out. Clearly they had no plan to deal with an outbreak which commons sense would suggest was bound to happen on some team.
UConn cancels their football season. First FBS school to do so.
Well at least they didnt waste anyones time with all those games they were gonna lose anyway
Yeah actually it's probably a way to guarantee Edsall another year. So maybe he secretly loves this. But all kidding aside, this isn't a good sign, and it certainly could lead to ramifications from some other schools on the fence as to what to do. One big difference with UConn than almost all the others however is the fact that they are now an independent and therefore dependent on forming a schedule against teams who belong to leagues, and as we know, the plans for a large portion of FBS schools are to put together a limited slate against league foes only, thereby limiting the choices of who the Huskies could play. In fact the only other indy that I can think of right now is Notre Dame, and if I'm not mistaken, the plans are for them to play in the ACC this coming season, the league they compete in in all the other sports anyway. So in the end, even though UConn will not be playing, I don't think this means the end of a college football season this fall.
Last Edit: Aug 5, 2020 8:32:23 GMT -5 by nashvillestag
Interesting. The financial impact on the athletic budgets of these schools is going to be huge. Football drives the bus for many of them, and provides the money for the less popular sports.
It is also interesting to note that the number of deaths due to COVID has dropped considerably since its peak in April.
And of the total number of deaths, only 225 have occurred among those age 15-24 since this all began.
I understand why older people, and those with health issues are concerned, but I can't help but wonder when they will open things up for younger folks?