Fresno State won’t start football camp as scheduled, but it can still start on time
The Fresno State Bulldogs will not open fall camp as scheduled on Aug. 7, their fourth coronavirus-related setback to starting a 2020 football season.
Whether the Bulldogs will be able to start on time with conferences adjusting scheduling their models, or start at all, are two of still seemingly hundreds of questions swirling around college athletics as it tries to plow through a pandemic that has not been slowed her or in other parts of the country.
“With the uncertainty, I do not believe it would be far-fetched to think we would not be looking at the possibilities of delays with any fall activities,” athletics director Terry Tumey said.
There could be some clarity for the Bulldogs soon, with the Mountain West board of directors scheduled to meet Friday to discuss fall sports.
The conference ostensibly has been waiting for the Power Five conferences to decide when and how a football season can be played. The Big Ten and Pac-12 already have announced they will be playing conference-only schedules, and the ACC is playing a 10-game conference season with one non-conference game.
The SEC announced on Thursday that it will play a 10-game conference-only schedule starting in late September.
The NCAA board of governors on Aug. 4 also could announce whether it will hold fall sports championship events including women’s soccer, women’s volleyball and men’s and women’s cross country.
Power Five games off
The Mountain West already has had 13 non-conference football games canceled against Pac-12 opponents and two against Big Ten teams. It lost four games against SEC teams, three of which carried hefty seven-figure guarantees that help fund athletics departments.
Fresno State was to receive $1.3 million to play at Texas A&M, Nevada $1.5 million to play at Arkansas and New Mexico $1 million to play at Mississippi State. The fourth SEC game is part of a four-game home-and-home series between Colorado State and Vanderbilt.
The MW still has one game on the schedule with the Big 12, which has yet to announce its plans for a 2020 football season.
The Mountain West could follow the Power Fives in going to a conference-only schedule, or perhaps push football and its other fall sports to the spring.
That would allow for a later start date for fall camp, though Fresno State would still be well behind conference rivals that have had student-athletes back on campus for voluntary workouts, some since June 1.
The Pac-12, in ditching its non-conference games, has said it will start playing football no earlier than Sept. 19. It is expected on Friday to announce its schedule.
The SEC will not start its season until Sept. 26, and the ACC is to go the week of Sept. 7.
Fresno State has yet to bring its football and fall sport student-athletes back to campus for workouts, as have many schools in the Mountain West and across the nation.
To open camp as scheduled on Aug. 7, the Bulldogs would have to have their football players back on campus by Friday to take a coronavirus test and enter a seven-day quarantine period before participating in any workouts.
It had health and safety protocols including daily screenings and temperature checks in place to start two weeks of mandatory workouts on July 13, going eight hours per week. It had the same protocols in place to start a second two-week period of mandatory workouts, meetings and walk-throughs on July 24, 20 hours per week.
For both mandatory sessions it opted against opening athletics facilities. The Bulldogs also missed all of their 15 spring practices due to the coronavirus.
The spike in COVID-19 cases in the Fresno area played a role in those decisions.
Fresno County on Wednesday had its largest one-day increase in confirmed coronavirus cases with nearly 600 people testing positive and across the valley the number of COVID-19 related deaths went past 400.