By Glory Jul, 09, 2020 Private

Due to the coronavirus pandemic which brought the global society to a halt, many sectors of the economy have slowed down.

As many sports teams, clubs, and companies proceed with their live sports with the absence of their audience, the Ivy League has decided to cancel its football schedule and other sports until the Covid-19 situation has been properly brought under control.

In a statement released by the league’s Council of Presidents, the decision was described as “extremely difficult.”

“With the information available to us today regarding the continued spread of the virus, we simply do not believe we can create and maintain an environment for intercollegiate athletic competition that meets our requirements for safety and acceptable levels of risk, consistent with the policies that each of our schools is adopting as part of it reopening plans for this fall,” said the league. “We are entrusted to create and maintain an educational environment that is guided by health and safety considerations. There can be no greater responsibility—and that is the basis for this difficult decision.”

The league includes Harvard, Yale, Princeton, Columbia, Dartmouth, Cornell, Brown, and University of Pennsylvania; an eight-member league.

The league is not only concerned about the implications of not playing in the fall, but also puts into consideration the health of the student. However, the league has said that student-athletes will be allowed to train using the schools’ facilities under strict safety conditions such as “limited individual and small group workouts.”

The athletics department at Clemson University reported 28 positive Covid-19 tests, with 23 of the tests coming from the football team, according to a University spokesman. Again, University of Texas had 13 football players who tested positive or were “presumed positive” for the coronavirus.

Considerations for reopening the Ivy league’s sporting activities are being made for January 2021. Hopefully, the pandemic situation should have been brought under control to a certain degree. A new football schedule may also be set up in the spring. Canceling the fall season could also have further implications such as delaying conferences and causing them to reconsider or reschedule their upcoming seasons.

According to the commissioner of the Big Ten Kevin Warren, the Ivy League and college boards have more to worry about beyond rescheduling the fall sports. Academics and students’ safety holds top priority.

“Even bigger than sports in the fall, we’re collectively focusing on what we need to do in school in the fall,” said Warren. “If we don’t have school in the fall, we don’t have sports in the fall. And so, we have a whole other level of issues that we’re focusing on.”

Ivy league’s decision to cancel fall sports makes it the first Division I conference to opt-out of the upcoming college football season. Other schools in the lower divisions, especially those in the Division III has opted out of the Centennial Conference. Some of the schools on the Division III include Johns Hopkins, McDaniel and other colleges in Maryland and Pennsylvania.

Tags: Ivy League College Sports college football American football

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