Old Dominion has made the call to cancel football and all of their fall sports, the school has now announced.
“We concluded the season – including travel & competition – posed too great a risk for our student-athletes," ODU president John Broderick shared. Athletic director Wood Selig notes in their release that he hopes fall sports can be played in the spring, ""but first and foremost it has to be safe for everyone involved and would also require NCAA approval."
ODU joins UConn as major college football programs who have made the decision to cancel football this fall.
Just four days ago, Zach did an article on the behind the scenes work that the ODU staff was having to do due to restrictions in place by the state of Virginia. First year head coach Ricky Rahne and his young staff really had their work cut out for them and had to get creative to get their practices in.
To get their work in under the state limitations in place, the ODU staff spent from 12pm to 6pm on the field overseeing three practices with players in three pods. Each of those pods were limited to 50 players at a time.
“It’s going to be very interesting. Like I told everyone when this (the pandemic) started, let’s not complain about things we can’t control. Let’s deal with the hand that’s been dealt to us," Rahne shared about the situation in that piece.
Rahne's staff and program will really put that outlook to the test as they enter a very untraditional fall.
Rahne released the following statement:
Adding in the 12 teams from the MAC, who announced over the weekend that they won't play football, plus UConn, that brings the total to 14 out of 130 FBS programs that officially will not take the field this fall. Monumental announcements are expected from the Big 10 and PAC-12 in the coming days.
Stay tuned to The Scoop for the latest.