LOUISVILLE, Ky. (WDRB) — There is optimism, but also realism.
There is enthusiasm, but also concern.
There are answers, but there are certainly questions.
Welcome to the day after the Atlantic Coast Conference announced its latest plan for the 2020 college football season, which is scheduled to begin in mid-September during the novel coronavirus pandemic.
Louisville Athletic Director Vince Tyra answered questions about the Cardinals’ 2020 football and fall sports programs late Thursday morning. Tyra had more answers than the last two times these topics were discussed, but he did not have all the answers. Nobody does.
"It feels like it moves us more into a known environment versus an unknown environment," Tyra said. "We were probably naive to believe that the schedules we had laid out for the fall could be executed as planned with the virus overshadowing some of those competitions with teams across country, or even teams that may not choose to meet the medical guidelines established by the ACC as much as the (Power 5) and the NCAA.
"So, in my mind, we now have a holistic plan that includes schedules that are more under our control while we're still allowing for some limited flexibility outside of our conference schedules."
I can reduce that 109-word answer four words: Be smart, be patient.
Tyra said he believed that the football season, now 11 games instead of 12, would be played. He embraced the addition of Notre Dame as an ACC member for one season, especially with the Irish contributing some of their NBC television money.
Tyra said that football practice would begin as scheduled next Tuesday. He said that he believed the league’s plan was workable.
After that?
Tyra sounded precisely the way any wise athletic director should sound, like a quarterback looking into strange coverage patterns while staying prepared to audible.
"I have a high level of optimism around a quasi-normal season ... ." Tyra said. "... I will tell you this: I feel a lot better today, with what we’ve laid out for all these sports, than I felt a week ago. I really do ... .
"... I feel like we’re closer to uniformity going into August than we were going into June when kids were returning to campus," he added. "That makes me feel better in terms of all of us being on the same page and that’s incredibly important."
How may fans will Louisville permit into Cardinal Stadium for its six home games?
Too soon to tell, although twice Tyra mentioned that Louisville City FC was operating at 30% capacity despite being approved for 50%. Tyra said his department would share information through what he called the school’s micro website: www.gocards.com/2020.
Will Kentucky and Louisville play their annual rivalry game?
Stay tuned. Depends on what scheduling guidelines the Southeastern Conference adopts.
If U of L and UK do not play, will either Western Kentucky or Murray State hold a spot on the Cardinals’ schedule?
That was another questions Tyra said must be answered later.
What about basketball, the sport pushed to the sidelines without a conclusion March 12? Have ACC athletic directors made a decision on when basketball will begin?
Not yet, Tyra said. One challenge at a time.
About 60 Louisville athletes returned to campus 60 days ago. Additional groups have followed. Tyra said that nearly 700 athletes and staff members have been tested for the virus. Positive tests have been limited to 13 athletes and three staff members.
Of course, Tyra and his fellow ADs have followed the unfolding situations with Major League Baseball, which has been forced to cancel multiple games every night since Monday because of the virus.
The NBA, which created a controlled bubble environment in Orlando, Florida, will resume its 2019-20 season with a pair of games Thursday night.
Tyra was asked how U of L and ACC teams will respond if a team is ravaged by the virus, the way the Florida Marlins have been.
"Yeah, I think we’ve had to think about that," he said. "You allow yourself a couple of bye weeks. I think you’ve also had to think about if someone were to lose a game in conference, what if somebody plays only nine games, versus 10? How do you go about that, in terms of a tiebreaker?
"So there’s a lot of thought around it. The good thing about football is you play once a week. Major league baseball plays five times a week (actually at least six and often seven) in different cities. It’s hard to make that same comparison.
"If a player contracts the virus and we’ve had to quarantine them, it’s unlikely they’re going to miss two games. The schedule, I mean, the timing would have to be awkward.
"The thing we’ve seen with the tests I mentioned, only about a third of them (with positive results) showed any symptoms. The other ones were just caught in the test and were just asymptomatic.
"The CDC guidelines have become a little more, I don’t want to say liberal, that’s probably a strong word, but in this case if you’re testing positive, you’ll see in the guidelines to come, you’re not going to be tested over and over with your teammates probably over a period of a few months.
"So it’s really you’re thinking about within the game. And we deal with it, with injuries. We dealt with it last year.
"Everybody comes to me asking, ‘What if it happens to your quarterback?’ You know Puma Pass was injured right away last year and we went without him. When Micale Cunningham became injured, we went down to Evan Conley, who did terrific. And Tutu (Atwell) was our backup, as a wide receiver.
"You deal with this in football with injuries and different things. They’re going to go on the injured reserve list for a different reason, not for an ankle sprain but potentially the virus.
"I don’t want to downplay it. It’s a serious thing here. It’s something we have to think about, how we’re going to deal with it in terms of how to get this schedule fulfilled."
What better way to return to normalcy than fussing about the UK-U of L game, which was originally scheduled for Nov. 28 at Cardinal Stadium.
What if it is not played? Would Kentucky owe Louisville a home game in 2021?
"We’re going to take it as a forfeit," Tyra said.
He laughed. It was a joke. Don’t post it on a message board.
"No, Mitch (Barnhart, the UK athletic director) and I talk about a lot of these things pretty comfortably so I am sure we get back on the phone work it out," Tyra said.
"It would definitely, assuming everything goes well with basketball, it'll be unusual that will be now counter years because we've been fortunate in our rivalry that we have, football and basketball played in the same city each year and it would potentially break it up," he added. "I hate to speculate, I'd have to talk Mitch about it but I don't foresee any issue there."
Related Stories:
- CRAWFORD | Tyra says Louisville is reviewing 'multiple models' for fans at games
- CRAWFORD | ACC settles on football plan, will start season Sept. 7, play 10 league games
Copyright 2020 WDRB Media. All rights reserved.
