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SBJ College: All Eyes On Football This Week


By the end of the week, there could be a newfound clarity on football and fall sports.

Now, let’s see what’s cooking on campus.

 

MAJOR DECISIONS ON TAP FOR COLLEGE FOOTBALL

  • The NCAA D-I Council meets tomorrow and the moratorium for on-campus activities, which runs through May 31, is on the agenda. The council, which is the chief rules-making body, could vote to lift the moratorium. If that happens, it would set the table for schools and conferences to bring their athletes back to campus -- voluntarily at first.

  • The SEC is poised to take its own action when university presidents meet on a call Friday. If the campus leaders agree, they could reopen athletic facilities as soon as June 1 for voluntary workouts. Based on recent comments from multiple ADs in the conference, it would be surprising if they don’t. Other conferences will likely follow; the Pac-12 is looking at its own ban, which goes through May 31 as well. The SEC, for now, has not officially announced a vote on resuming athletic activities.

  • College football's 2020 season starts with limited games on Aug. 29 and a full slate on Sept. 5. That gives athletes a full 6-8 weeks to condition starting in July and hold training camps in August. That’s been considered best-case scenario all along and if campuses re-open athletic facilities in June, those dates appear within reach. It’s worth reminding how quickly things have changed -- almost by the hour -- over the last 10 weeks, and circumstances remain very fluid.

 

BACK TO SCHOOL? WHAT TO EXPECT

  • When athletes return to campus, they’ll find modifications to the weight room and training areas. Training groups will be smaller and they will enter the facilities on a staggered schedule to ease congestion. Cleaning protocols will be strict and use the latest tech.

  • Many questions remain about the return of athletes. Here are a few being asked around college athletics now:

    • Would football carry on if campuses remain shut down for the rest of the student body? I reported last week that there’s a strong sentiment toward playing anyway. But when I spoke with former Tulane President Scott Cowen, he said: “I wouldn’t want to be in a position to have to defend a different policy for student athletes than the other students. I don’t know what I’d say.”

    • How are athletes and their parents going to react? Will they feel safe? Testing every couple of days would be one way to provide safeguards and Big 12 Commissioner Bob Bowlsby thinks that is possible.

    • What will happen when an athlete tests positive for COVID-19? Who will be notified and how? “If one of our athletes gets the coronavirus, we can’t just shut the whole thing down,” West Virginia President Gordon Gee told ESPN’s Paul Finebaum.

  

 

PAC-12, OAK VIEW GROUP BEHIND NEW BASKETBALL EVENT

  • Four of college basketball’s top programs -- Baylor (men and women) and Oregon (men and women) -- will headline an innovative new basketball concept this season. The Pac-12 Coast-to-Coast Challenge will launch in December with the Ducks and Bears squaring off in a doubleheader at T-Mobile Arena. That will be the first two of four games in Las Vegas on the weekend before Christmas. Two men's matchups -- Washington-Oklahoma and TCU-Colorado -- round out the event. Pac-12 Deputy Commissioner Jamie Zaninovich has been working on the new format for more than a year with Dan Shell from Oak View Group (OVG) and veteran promoter Chris Spencer.

  • In the event’s second year in 2021, those same eight teams will play at AmericanAirlines Arena in Dallas. Meanwhileeight new teams from the Pac-12 and Big East will meet in Vegas. Those eight will then play in New York in 2022, possibly at the under-construction Belmont Park Arena. All of these venues are managed by OVG. This rotation continues for five years.

  • The event achieves several goals, most prominently providing the Pac-12 with quality opponents and exposure. The conference was essentially boxed out because the ACC and Big Ten have their challenge, and the SEC and Big 12 do their own series. The event also deepens the Pac-12’s relationship with Vegas. The conference already plays its basketball tournaments there, and its football championship is moving there this season.

  • OVG’s Shell will handle the business side, selling sponsorships and media rights. Fox is believed to be in the mix, but nothing has been finalized. OVG doesn’t do a lot of business in college -- a new arena at Texas is its largest deal. This event gives OVG a chance to drive marquee events into buildings it manages.

 

 

FURMAN, ECU, CENTRAL MICHIGAN AMONG LATEST TO CUT PROGRAMS

  • Yesterday, it was Furman baseball and men's lacrosse. Today, it’s Central Michigan men’s track and field -- both the indoor and outdoor programs. East Carolina said cuts are coming, but it hasn’t identified the sports yet. The steady drip, drip, drip of news about cutting sports is upon us.

  • AkronCincinnatiFIU and Old Dominion also have cut sports this year. It’s no coincidence that these schools are in the Group of 5 (except Furman) and they’re facing steep budget cuts for 2020-21. These will not be the last schools to eliminate sports.

 

 

SPEED READS

  • The NCAA has begun its search for a new Senior VP/Inclusion, Education & Community Engagement. This position will report to NCAA President Mark Emmert and serve as the governing body's lead diversity officer. Exec VP Katrice Albert, who left the NCAA in March, previously oversaw diversity initiatives.

  • WME has signed "The Solid Verbal," a college football podcast, for representation, per The Hollywood Reporter. The agency "will work with hosts Ty Hildenbrandt and Dan Rubenstein to increase digital distribution and look for TV, touring and merchandising opportunities for the year-round podcast." The podcast launched in August 2008 and at one point was part of Grantland.

  • The NCAA’s appeal in the Alston case didn’t change much. The U.S. Court of Appeals ruled yesterday that the NCAA cannot cap how much schools can compensate their athletes as long as its tethered to education. That means a school can buy a laptop for athletes or pay for their grad school tuition, but not a car. Some schools might be able to offer more scholarship aid than others with fewer resources.

  • Georgia football "spent $422,047.07 on 42 recruiting trips by chartered air planes for coach Kirby Smart and members of his staff" last December. Those flights "landed in 23 different cities outside of Georgia’s borders, some as far away as Van Nuys, Calif., and Ontario, Canada." UGA football coaches "boarded chartered flights at least 74 times between September and mid-December of last year," via the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.

  • The "Cover 3 College Football Podcast" looked at Martin Jarmond -- a two-time SBJ "Forty Under 40" honoree -- becoming the next UCLA AD, with CBS Sports' Barton Simmons saying: "He's inheriting an athletic department that is in bad shape financially. They are suddenly -- because of huge hires and investments in basketball and football and dwindling attendance and dwindling booster support -- working at a huge deficit. ... Supposedly he was a superstar fundraiser at Boston College. Maybe that's the reason they landed him." 

 

NOMINATIONS OPEN FOR SBJ GAME CHANGERS!

 

 

 

Enjoying this newsletter? We've got more! Check out SBJ Media with John Ourand on Mondays and Wednesdays for insights into all the latest news around the world of sports media. Also check out SBJ Unpacks on week nights, as we look at how the sports industry is being impacted by COVID-19.

Something on the College beat catch your eye? Tell us about it. Reach out to either me (msmith@sportsbusinessjournal.com) or Austin Karp (akarp@sportsbusinessjournal.com) and we'll share the best of it. Also contributing to this newsletter is Thomas Leary (tleary@sportsbusinessdaily.com).