A decision about the future of NCAA fall sports championships has been put on hold by the NCAA Board of Governors at a special meeting held Friday.
NCAA President Mark Emmert in a released statement said the discussion about the fall championships will be continued during the next scheduled meeting on August 4th.
He also said “The health and well-being of college athletes is the highest priority in deciding whether to proceed with our 22 NCAA championships beginning in late November. We all remain deeply concerned about the infection trend lines we see. It is clear that the format of our championships will have to change if they are to be conducted in a safe and fair manner.”.
The Complete statement is located below.
If the NCAA were to cancel all fall sports championships that would include football for FCS, and Divisions II and III along with volleyball, mens and womens cross country and soccer and a number of other sports.
Earlier this week the MIAA announced that the fall sports seasons would not start until the week of September 28th. The football season has been reduced to 7 games.
Several Division II conferences have already canceled their fall sports seasons.
According to a Sports Illustrated story on-line the NCAA can cancel the championships but they cannot cancel the regular seasons.
Two FBS conferences, the Big Ten and Pac-12, have already moved to conference-only schedules. The SEC, ACC and Big 12 will supposedly decide their near-term futures by the end of the month.
Statement from NCAA President Mark Emmert.
“Today the Board of Governors and I agreed that we must continue to thoughtfully and aggressively monitor health conditions around the country and the implementation of the COVID-19 guidelines we issued last week. The health and well-being of college athletes is the highest priority in deciding whether to proceed with our 22 NCAA championships beginning in late November. We all remain deeply concerned about the infection trend lines we see. It is clear that the format of our championships will have to change if they are to be conducted in a safe and fair manner. We discussed other complexities in addition to the health and safety impacts, to include team availability, travel limitations and various local and state restrictions. We will continue our discussions in August.”
