SEC sports officially ends with eye now on football and fall sports

Southeastern Conference commissioner Greg Sankey announced on Wednesday that all spring sports are cancelled but there was a slight chance spring football practice could resume after April 15. (Contributed)

By TIM GAYLE

The uncharted waters traveled by the sports world as it deals with the coronavirus pandemic was on full display Wednesday as Southeastern Conference commissioner Greg Sankey held a teleconference to discuss the recent and future decisions made by conference officials in the sports world.

“It’s important for us, in fact I’d say imperative, that we address these issues through a community lens,” Sankey said. “While we are athletic leaders and athletic administrators, we want to do whatever we can to help reduce the risk of exposure and the spread of COVID-19.

“I will note some questions right now are unanswerable. I have said … ‘I don’t know’ is a perfectly acceptable answer and we have an obligation to figure out what those answers will be moving forward. And we’re in one of those circumstances in life where there may be more ‘I don’t knows’ than ‘I know’ how something will play out.”

Sankey made the decision last week to suspend all play involving the Southeastern Conference’s 14 teams through March 30 and later extended that suspension to April 15. While Sankey ultimately would cancel all competition through the remainder of the 2019-20 school year, on Wednesday he left the door slightly ajar for the resumption of football practice.

“It does not apply to spring practices at this time, and I think that’s the important qualifying phrase,” he said. “We have said no athletic activities through April 15. That doesn’t mean we’ll be back to normal or to practice activities April 16, it was just a date that allows our administrators to communicate with our coaches, our coaches with their student athletes. 

“If you look at the national public messaging about no gatherings above 50, (it is) certainly difficult to conduct any football practice under that limitation, and even with smaller numbers, it had been communicated 10, as often referenced, thereby making it impossible into May, has been stated. So I’m not going to be overly optimistic about the return to practice. We haven’t fully foreclosed that opportunity but I think practically that window’s pretty narrow.”

Sankey’s teleconference covered a range of issues from the future rotation of campus championship sites to an extra year of eligibility, but the commissioner made it clear on several occasions that an opinion or decision made on Wednesday could change on Thursday.

“I’m looking to the health experts to guide us,” he said. “I’m also interested in what other sport organizations. Last Thursday morning, we saw the circumstance in the Oklahoma City-Utah game where a Utah player tested positive (for coronavirus) , saw that story right as I was walking into a press conference and then that the NBA had suspended its season and you start to process that information, so there are learning experiences for us all in regard to what we do in sport. But each of us is looking to the health experts to guide our decision making.”

The timeline for dealing with the virus escalated rapidly last week from Wednesday to Thursday, forcing the conference to change from playing SEC Tournament basketball games in empty arenas to canceling the remainder of the season after the NCAA announced it was canceling its postseason tournament.

“Perhaps we could have communicated better,” Sankey admitted, “but everyone was working in real time to make the best decisions on the best available information and that’s the way things played out on Thursday.”

With that in mind, Sankey said future decisions regarding student-athletes in spring sports, such as restoring a year of eligibility, is something that must be handled carefully but efficiently.

“I actually printed about eight pages of analysis from our conference compliance staff,” Sankey said. “Myself and my colleagues have had just preliminary discussions about what might this mean.  I know among the conferences, there’s conversations … that’s an appropriate step. From my perspective, we have to understand the full set of implications and I hope we’ll move through those rapidly because I think one of the assets for our young people is knowing definitively what their eligibility status will be going forward. I do want to say, I don’t think this is simply a senior issue.  Everybody in our programs, particularly spring sports, had their season disrupted, so my encouragement is we take a broad look at what type of opportunities we offer going forward.”

When asked whether that might apply to student-athletes in winter sports who were unable to play for a championship, Sankey hesitated.

“We’ll just observe my view that we need to deal in a time efficient manner with the spring sport situation,” he said. “There does need to be a conversation about the disrupted winter sports, which for us would include both men’s and women’s basketball, swimming and diving, gymnastics, and equestrian. I don’t have the answer to that right now. I know that’s an agenda item nationally (but) I don’t have a prediction right now.”

The prediction everyone wanted to ask concerned the upcoming 2020 football season and whether the NCAA calendar may be adjusted to permit spring practice in June.

“What I’d say is let’s not just define some structure,” he said. “If we’re not able to practice further this spring, I’m confident that we’ll be seeking opportunities to make sure our teams our adequately prepared heading into the season. Elements of that are going to be guided by the public health realities in front of us.  

“I’m a half-full perspective person, so I have optimism.  We have taken measures as have our colleague conferences that if I read those health leaders (correctly), we’re going to have a period of time to see what happens with the growth of these cases and we’ll make decisions down the road.”

In the meantime, he reiterated, decisions must be made with public health as the priority and sports as a secondary issue. 

“You’ve seen Major League Baseball teams that have sent individuals home,” Sankey said. “You’ve seen messaging out of NHL teams that says, ‘Go home, don’t go to gyms.’ You’ve seen states that have closed down gyms to stop the spread. A lot of conversation because that can be a connecting point but the need to create community distance is at the heart of that issue.”