NCAA approves start of basketball, but what about Fresno State?
COVID-19 numbers are improving in Fresno County, but will that be enough for Fresno State to get a go-ahead from university officials to play basketball this season with the NCAA on Wednesday setting a start date for workouts, practices and games?
Athletics director Terry Tumey is not ruling out an opt out for the Bulldogs at this point, but said that he is very optimistic the Bulldogs will be playing basketball.
“Fresno State is going to try to exhaust as many opportunities as possible to provide some participation,” Tumey said.
“We’re trying to see how we can do that effectively, so I’m very optimistic. I’m not saying it’s going to happen, but I’m optimistic that Fresno State will be moving in a direction trying to figure out the right way to participate.”
The NCAA Division I Council on Wednesday approved a plan with men’s and women’s basketball games to start on Nov. 25 — 15 days later than originally scheduled and after most Division I schools will have concluded fall semester classes.
Practices can start as early as Oct. 14, with 42 days to conduct 30 practices. There also is a period of strength and conditioning workouts, skill instruction and meetings for up to 12 hours per week that can start on Sept. 21 and run through Oct. 13.
That is less than one week away, but at Fresno State university officials have yet to clear student-athletes to return to campus to participate in even voluntary workouts due to state and local coronavirus health and safety guidelines.
Fresno County COVID-19 guidelines key
The Bulldogs sit idle, with differing degrees of patience. Fresno County remains in the most restrictive of the state’s four color-coded tiers based on the rate of daily new cases and the rate of positive test results. But it did on Tuesday report 36 new coronavirus infections, its fewest since there were 32 on June 14, and appears to be closer to moving from the Purple tier representing a widespread risk of COVID-19 transmission to the Red tier, or a substantial risk.
San Diego State and San Jose State, the other two California schools in the Mountain West Conference, are in counties that are in the Red tier and closer to opening more businesses and activities.
But with a start date for basketball now set and improving coronavirus numbers, that could be the spur for university administrators to at least look to return student-athletes to campus.
Mountain West athletics directors are scheduled to meet on Thursday, as they have for the past few months working toward a football season postponed to the spring from the fall and the start of men’s and women’s basketball and winter sports.
“Multiple subgroups within the conference are working daily on solutions to the existing challenges in order to facilitate a return to play for Mountain West football, and other Conference sport programs, at the earliest possible opportunity,” commissioner Craig Thompson said, in a statement from the league released after the Big Ten announced it would play a fall football season with games starting the weekend of Oct. 24.
Challenges ahead for basketball season
“This includes finalizing a plan for frequent, rapid response testing and continuing to monitor the status of public health directives in our MW states and communities.”
For basketball, there are a lot of moving pieces – teams this season can play up to 27 games (a reduction of four) and as few as 13 to be eligible for the postseason, with a recommendation of four non-conference contests coming from the Division I Men’s Basketball and Division I Women’s Basketball committees. There will be no scrimmages or exhibition games this season.
Fresno State had not announced a full non-conference basketball schedule before shut down by the coronavirus – it did have a game at Utah in December and was scheduled to play in the Southern California Challenge over the Thanksgiving weekend.
If able to move forward in the state’s COVID-19 guidelines and get on the court, the availability and ability to procure rapid-results coronavirus tests will be critical for Fresno State as it was for the Big Ten in making a return to a fall football season.
“It really is going to boil down to our ability to be able to understand the health and safety of each individual through testing,” Tumey said.
“There’s new prospects of testing that may help us in terms of understanding the safety for our student-athletes. That’s the key. That’s where the question begins. If we cannot come to some understanding on how to utilize those tests, then we are going to fall into some difficult times and face some difficult questions as it relates to how we move forward.”