Michigan, Ohio State, Notre Dame, USC among teams suspending/canceling spring football

The effects of the coronavirus are impacting college football with a wave of spring football games getting canceled.

Michigan and Ohio State have canceled their spring football games that were scheduled to take place in mid-April.

The decision comes in the wake of the global pandemic surrounding the coronavirus. The NBA, MLB, NHL and MLS have all suspended their seasons. More than a dozen college basketball conference tournaments were canceled on Thursday morning.

The NCAA announced the NCAA Tournaments will go on without fans in attendance and limited access for family and essential personnel. It feels inevitable that the NCAA Tournament will be postponed if not canceled. I think the delay in the response is about how they’ll handle the logistics of the $1 billion dollar TV contracts.

But there has been no delay in making a decision in regard to COVID-19 from Michigan and Ohio State who canceled the spring game and imposed travel restrictions for recruiting. Coaches will no longer be allowed to travel for recruiting activities and coaches can’t host recruits on official or unofficial visits.

Michigan and Ohio State are rivals but these two universities set the expectation that other schools are following. Notre Dame canceled its spring game too and imposed recruiting restrictions.

Penn State did the same.

USC has also suspended spring activities, Illinois has suspended spring football and recruiting, Kent State canceled everything, Cincinnati was the first program to cancel its spring game earlier this week.

Further, the SEC has suspended regular-season activities on SEC campuses until March 30 that will affect baseball, softball, track and field and other spring sports.

And the SEC was followed by the ACC making a similar decision.

There will be more announcements from teams and conferences as teams exercise caution to protect their players, coaches and prevent the spread of the coronavirus to college campuses nationwide.

Spring football may be canceled. The spring games may not take place, and if they do, there may not be fans. Everyone is learning as much information as they can from the medical professionals and taking that advice before making decisions.

For more information about COVID-19, visit the CDC’s website or the website for your state’s Department of Health.

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