Fresno State football is coming back — but the Mountain West expects COVID-19 cancellations
In jumping back into a fall football season the Mountain West will require players, coaches, trainers and on-field personnel to take three COVID-19 antigen tests per week, a cost that will run “well into the millions of dollars” and be paid by the conference from a reserve fund, Commissioner Craig Thompson said.
Thompson also said Friday that he expects all 12 conference schools will be able to play — though several including Fresno State must still clear state, county or local guidelines.
And with no wiggle room in a proposed eight-games-in-eight weeks schedule, he is not expecting all 12 programs to make it through the season without cancellations.
“I would fully anticipate that not all 12 institutions in the Mountain West will play eight games for various reasons, just based on what we’ve seen the first three weeks of this season,” he said.
A number of programs that did not postpone seasons have had to cancel or reschedule games due to the coronavirus – Houston has had four attempts at a season-opening game, postponing or canceling games against Rice, Memphis, Baylor and on Wednesday North Texas.
This weekend, six games including North Texas and Houston have been postponed: Notre Dame also will not play at Wake Forest, Tulsa will not play at Arkansas State, South Florida will not play at Florida Atlantic, Georgia State will not play at Charlotte and Temple will not play at Navy.
Mountain West coronavirus testing protocols
The Mountain West, though, will move forward. After announcing on Aug. 10 it was postponing football and fall sports, it is targeting Oct. 24 to start its season, pending state and county approvals. A conference championship game would be played on Dec. 19, the day before the College Football Playoff bowl selections.
The conference has partnered with Quest Diagnostics to implement testing protocols to deliver rapid-result testing that was considered a critical part in that decision. Any student-athlete who tests positive through point of contact (POC) testing would require a polymerase chain reaction (PCR) test to confirm that result.
The Big Ten, which also is moving forward with football in the fall after postponing its season, has adopted daily antigen tests. The Pac-12 also is expected to test daily.
“It’s a really good question to talk about antigen testing and why only three times a week when others people are doing it six, seven,” said Dr. Tony A. Islas, head team physician at Nevada and a member of the MW Health & Safety Advisory Group. “When you look at the sensitivity and specificity for antigen testing, doing it multiple times during the week actually increases your chances of actually getting rid of that sort of decrease in sensitivity specificity.
“The good news with us, though, is that we’re using an antigen test that is new to the market through Quest labs that is actually really sensitive and really specific. It is just tiny fraction less than a PCR test, and so by us doing it multiple times a week we’re kind of hedging our bets in our favor that we’ll catch a positive. And we’re confident that because the test is actually a very sensitive and very specific test, that we’ll probably be able to factor out those false negatives and false positives, as well.”
The conference still is finalizing how to monitor testing results and other health and safety protocols including thresholds for a minimum number of available players or available players in a position group that will be required for competition.
“As we speak, the nine leagues that are scheduled to play or have started to play have variances on that,” Thompson said. “Some have minimums of 53 players, a specific number. Some have specific per position, and we have to determine that with our athletics directors.”
Issues with fall football game schedule
Scheduling also remains a question and with Air Force scheduled to play Navy on Oct. 3 and Army on Nov. 7, the Falcons could end up with seven Mountain West games and nine games total. Boise State, which has a previously scheduled game against BYU on its schedule, also could play only seven conference opponents.
“We’re working frantically and quickly and expeditiously. We have several models,” the Mountain West commissioner said. “The ADs meet twice a week and will continue to discuss it. In the very near future, we will have a schedule.”
The Mountain West will not necessarily stick to the schedule it had before the coronavirus pandemic forced the shutdown of football and fall sports.
Fresno State this season was scheduled to play its West Division rivals as well as Air Force, Colorado State and Utah State from the Mountain Division.
There will be no minimum number of games to be eligible for the conference championship game, which will be played on the home field of the team with the highest winning percentage. The title game, which since 2013 has pitted the winners of the West and Mountain divisions, also could change this season with the teams with the highest winning percentages playing for the championship.
“Right now we’re still structured on the divisional play, but that’s going to be determined and discussed in the coming weeks with the athletics directors,” Thompson said. “We might just go to the top two winning percentages, but right now it’s still West versus Mountain.”
This story was originally published September 25, 2020 at 1:19 PM.