It was a somber scene Friday afternoon when UF athletic director Scott Stricklin arrived at Ben Hill Griffin Stadium, where he held an impromptu press conference.
Just minutes before he arrived, the SEC announced that all organized team activities — including competitions, practices and meetings — will be suspended through April 15.
“My sense is that’s probably optimistic,” Stricklin said. “I’m not an expert, but what we’ve been told here on campus we probably need to expect that potentially to go longer, and we’ll just have to be prepared for that.”
This was the latest announcement from an athletic entity in response to the growing concern of COVID-19. The NCAA announced earlier this week that all winter and spring championships have been cancelled and all professional sports leagues have also been suspended or postponed.
In his opening statement, Stricklin said that he is encouraging UF student-athletes to return home — like the rest of the student body has been told by university administration — and was cognizant that for some, it may not be feasible.
“We (the UAA) are going to have our training room open, so from a sports health, and just a health in general standpoint, we’ll be able to service the needs of those that are here.”
The Hawkins Center — the academic center for student-athletes — will also remain open.
A large theme of Stricklin opening statement was how the sports world has progressively transitioned to trying to play games to trying to do what’s best for the health and safety of both athletes and fans. He credited UF’s preparedness on that front.
According to Stricklin, the first meeting he had regarding COVID-19 was on Feb. 6.
After the opening statement, Stricklin was asked questions regarding spring football, which was scheduled to begin training on Monday.
“I would say at this point it’s in flux,” Stricklin said. “Obviously, we’re not going to go through normal spring ball as we had scheduled and we’re probably not going to have a spring game on April 18. Beyond that, we’re not in a position to make definitive comments.”
When asked if spring practice could simply start later in the summer, that got Stricklin’s attention.
“That calendar works now, they’re (players) here pretty much all the time,” he said. “So, whether we try to squeeze in spring ball late spring, early summer, whether the NCAA works with everybody to start practices earlier in the fall – assuming we’re able to have a fall – those are things that we need to figure out.”
When it comes to both spring and winter sports, another major factor to consider is eligibility. There has been an outpouring of emotions on social media after the NCAA announced there would be no more championships in regard to all the senior athletes who won’t get a chance to compete for a national championship.
Earlier today, the NCAA released a statement that said eligibility relief is appropriate for all Division I student-athletes who participated in spring sports. Stricklin was fully on board.
“We’ve got to worry about helping young people get their year of eligibility back and then what do you do about roster sizes because there’s another group of freshmen, in many cases that have already been recruited and signed here with the expectation that kids are going to be graduating and moving on,” he said.
Stricklin was also supportive of winter athletes getting an extra year of eligibility as well.
“I may be in the minority here, I think any senior who had a championship opportunity taken away because of this should get another year,” he said. “Whether that happens or not I don’t know.”
If spring sports do resume, then there would be a shortened season for sports like baseball and softball. Stricklin said he received a text from UF softball coach Tim Walton after he spoke to his players and said that they were not fans of playing a truncated season without the chance to win a national championship.
Stricklin also said that the school’s revenue from spring sports is “not a significant number” and that the financial ramifications of all the decisions being made aren’t being considered.
“The most important thing is we, as a society and community and a university, take the steps necessary to protect our young people, protect our staff and our coaches, and protect our fans who love watching our young people compete.”
Follow Joseph Salvador on Twitter @JosephSalvador_. Contact him at jsalvador@alligator.org.
Scott Stricklin addressed the future of spring sports at UF Friday afternoon.
