For college football followers, it's the billion-dollar question, and given Pitt's experienced roster filled with seniors and NFL Draft-eligible players, it takes on a greater sense of urgency.
Will there be a fall sports season?
Pitt director of athletics Heather Lyke addressed that and a variety of other pertinent issues during a Zoom conference call with reporters Wednesday morning from Laurel Valley Golf Club just outside of Ligonier, Pa., where football coach Pat Narduzzi was hosting his annual outing. The conference call came a day after Lyke, who appeared remotely, asked members of a Senate Judiciary Committee during a hearing in Washington D.C. to prohibit betting on college sports.
And Lyke's thoughts on college football starting on time or happening at all shouldn't come as a surprise given the recent trend in college athletics, where big-time institutions such as the Big Ten and Pac-12 conferences already adopted a league-only model for fall sports and others at the FCS, Division II and III levels suspended fall sports activities through 2020.
"As I said this before, I'm really an optimistic person, but I wouldn't say that I'm overly confident," Lyke said. "So much depends on, probably, really two key issues. One is really our national trend across the country in the number of cases. Obviously, we have seen it really escalate recently. So if that continues on that trajectory, that would not be a very good fact for us. And then, you know, access to testing and time results. So that's another key issue is making sure we have access to tests and results as quickly as possible."
A decision on fall sports could come as early as Friday from the NCAA Board of Governors, but reports say the Division I Football Oversight Committee has asked for more time to access to COVID-19 pandemic.
Lyke is not part of that committee, which is chaired by West Virginia athletic director Shane Lyons, but she also would like a final decision to be made at a later date. The ACC previously said it would wait until late July to make a final decision on fall sports though it pushed the start date back to Sept. 1.
"I don't think there is a right decision, but I do think that they are going to take as much information as possible and try to make this decision," Lyke said. "There is some hope that, you know, let's wait and try to assess things as much as possible because a month ago, you might have said, 'Hey, we're ready.'
"If they would cancel the championships it, obviously, it's a domino to how do we manage football and what do we do from there."
The Football Bowl Subdivision and College Football Playoff still could stage a season because they are not administered by the NCAA, but the obstacles would be numerous.
"Right now, we're just not in an ideal spot in the country as we all know, and we continue to just manage through the issues every day, every week," Lyke said. "Our goal and our No. 1 goal will always be to keep our student-athletes safe and our staff safe."
About 300 student-athletes from Pitt's football, men's and women's basketball, men's and women's soccer, men's and women's swimming, volleyball, wrestling and gymnastics teams have returned to campus. Upon their return, they were given an option to be tested for COVID-19, but if anyone displayed symptoms, tests were promptly administered.
Student-athletes also complete a daily questionnaire on their mobile devices, but unlike places such as Ohio State, Pitt did not request liability waivers be signed. Lyke said Pitt instead opted for a two-step approach based on increased education and accountability.
After a two-week quarantine, athletes worked out in groups of 10 with members of the strength and conditioning staff. From there, Pitt hoped to increase the number to 50 per workout but, because of orders made by Gov. Tom Wolf, have been working out in groups of 25.
With classes at Pitt set to begin Aug. 19 and football training camp tentatively scheduled for an Aug. 7 launch, scheduled events rapidly are approaching.
"We're hopeful, but again, I'm not super optimistic that it's going to be a very traditional fall camp season," Lyke said.
There have been some positive developments at Pitt.
• No workouts have been shutdown because of a proliferation of positive COVID-19 test results.
• None of the athletic department's 19 sports teams are in danger of being cut. "We're in a really good position that the university is very financially sound and making wise decisions with regards to finances moving forward," Lyke said.
• No member of the athletic staff has been asked to take a salary cut, and no furloughs have been made.
• Even fundraising efforts for Victory Heights initiative, a series of state-of-the-art athletics projects to provide athletes and band members with significantly improved facilities, continues though the technical project is on hold.
But several discussion points are yet to be determined.
• On the possibility of ACC fall sports moving to a schedule based on geographic pods, Lyke said: "We've talked about minimizing travel and trying to regionalize things, also keep the Coastal and Atlantic divisions intact. There's been a whole, wide variety of issues. We have not settled on one decision, yet. But I would say every kind of iteration that you could come up with, we've talked about or discussed and evaluated the pros and cons of that. "
• Richmond, a member of the FCS Colonial Athletic Association, is scheduled to play at Pitt on Sept. 19. The CAA canceled conference football games amid COVID-19 concerns but told its member institutions it could play a non-conference schedule.
"We have been in touch with all of our non-conference opponents just to reach out to understand and to have real transparent communication going back and forth with regards to what their plans are, because even if they were available to play, we would need to make sure they were meeting the guidelines of our ACC medical advisory group in order to play them," Lyke said.
• On fans attending games: "Fans would be dependent on the governor's orders," and Pitt has projections where anywhere from 15,000 to 20,000 could attend games at Heinz Field if permitted.
• As for moving the fall sports season to spring, Lyke said that's easier said than accomplished.
"If we had to shut down fall sports for some reason, it is honestly a pretty significant logistical challenge. I think at Pitt we could definitely manage it. There are some schools that have a lot more sports than us."
• On keeping student-athletes socially distanced from the rest of campus when classes resume: "It's impossible to keep kids away from one another."
If a college football season this fall possible? The coming days are paramount to reaching a decision.
"I think the next two weeks are pretty critical for decision-making on whether its scheduling or championships and those sorts of things," Lyke said.
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