In an ominous sign for the 2020 Division I college football season, the NCAA has officially canceled ALL Division III fall sports and they will not be made up.
“NCAA Division III championships in fall sports for 2020-21 are canceled,” reads a statement on the NCAA’s website. “With the health and safety of the division’s student-athletes, coaches, athletics administrators and communities as its priority, the Division III Presidents Council made the decision Wednesday to cancel the championships due to the COVID-19 pandemic and related administrative and financial challenges.
“The Board of Governors directed each division to make a decision on its fall sport championships. It also agreed to require all members institutions to apply the resocialization principles to fall sports and set a 50% sponsorship threshold for a fall sport championship to be conducted.”
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“Looking at the health and safety challenges we face this fall during this unprecedented time, we had to make this tough decision to cancel championships for fall sports this academic year in the best interest of our student-athlete and member institutions,” Tori Murden McClure, chair of the Presidents Council and president at Spalding, said on Wednesday. “Our Championships Committee reviewed the financial and logistical ramifications if Division III fall sports championships were conducted in the spring and found it was logistically untenable and financially prohibitive. Our Management Council reached the same conclusion. Moving forward, we will try to maximize the championships experience for our winter and spring sport student-athletes, who unfortunately were short-changed last academic year.”
This news comes on the heels of the announcement that the independent UConn Huskies have chosen to become the first major college football program to voluntarily cancel their own season due to the ongoing pandemic.
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The Big Ten, Big 12, and SEC, and ACC (including Notre Dame) have all announced tentative plans to still hold their football seasons.
The Pac 12 is currently in the midst of dealing with the potential of hundreds of players threatening to sit out the season if not paid and given better protections against becoming infected with the coronavirus.
