First it was the Centennial Conference, then it was the Middle Atlantic Conference.
Now it’s the Pennsylvania State Athletic Conference.
The NCAA Division II conference consisting mostly of Pennsylvania colleges and universities announced Wednesday morning it canceled all athletic competition during the fall semester through Dec. 31, the latest sports casualty during the coronavirus pandemic.
That means no fall sports season for the conference and at least a delayed start to the winter sports schedule.
PSAC officials said they voted Tuesday evening and the conference has “already undertaken a full review of its ability to shift fall sports competition and championships to the spring semester” if it’s safe to do so.
Conference officials also said they will consider scheduling changes for any sports in the spring semester but had no details as of Wednesday morning.
“The entire conference has worked hard these last few months to prepare for the return of sports to our campuses beginning this fall,” PSAC commissioner Steve Murray said in the news release. “However, it has become apparent that the safe conduct of sports under the guidelines of social distancing is untenable for our members. We cannot place our student-athletes at greater risk than the general student body. Despite our planning and collective efforts, it has become clear that we are not able to do so.”
The PSAC said it and its members “will develop guidelines for all teams to continue individual skill instruction as well as strength and conditioning activities under social distancing protocols by the end of the summer.” They will decide at a later time when winter and spring sports can begin workouts and practices.
“This decision was not made lightly,” Shippensburg athletic director Jeff Michaels said in the school’s news release. “It is our intent to have all sports competing during the spring semester. The next six weeks will be used to determine what types of countable athletically-related activities will be permitted during the fall semester and planning for the return to competition in the spring.”
In a phone call Wednesday afternoon, Michaels said the PSAC intends to announce a plan for how it will integrate all three seasons into the spring semesters within 4-6 weeks. There is no leading plan at the moment, he said, but the conference has had “a little bit of dialogue” in the last 10 days.
“There are gonna be challenges, there’s no question,” he said when asked how feasible it will be to move fall sports to the spring. “There’s facilities challenges, there’s gonna be personnel challenges, too.”
Among the challenges will be having multiple seasons overlapping and requiring practice space, gym space and time with trainers, strength and conditioning staff and the athletic department’s other resources.
“How do we get to where all our teams get to where [they need to be and give everyone equal treatment]?” Michaels said. “We have great people who will do everything they can to make sure it’s the same experience.”
Michaels said he began to realize the fall would be canceled in the last few weeks. He described the challenges the conference faced as answering one question, only for four or five more to pop up.
“I think in the end it’s definitely the right decision,” he said.
The NCAA has not announced if fall sports athletes will get an extra year of eligibility as it did when it canceled all spring sports and championships. That’s in part because the NCAA has not canceled fall championships or seasons yet, Michaels said.
Even if athletes do get an extra year of eligibility, Michaels said it’s unclear what it would mean for athletes who intended to graduate in December, some of whom may have lined up jobs by them.
Reports about the PSAC decision started circulating Tuesday night following a PSAC presidents meeting that evening.
The conference consists of 18 schools, one of the largest in NCAA Division II, including: Bloomsburg, California (Pa.), Clarion, East Stroudsburg, Edinboro, Gannon, IUP, Kutztown, Lock Haven, Mansfield, Mercyhurst, Millersville, Pitt-Johnstown, Seton Hill, Shepherd, Shippensburg, Slippery Rock and West Chester.
Shepherd is the only school not in Pennsylvania.
It took eight days for the local college sports landscape to be upended for the second time in 2020. In mid-March, the NCAA quickly canceled all remaining winter sports championships and the remainder of the spring sports season because of the coronavirus.
In the last week as well, the Ivy League and the Patriot League became the first D-I conferences to cancel their fall sports seasons, while the Big Ten and Pac-12 announced recently they would limit member schools to conference-only games this fall.
The attention now shifts to the high school scene. The PIAA has a meeting scheduled for Wednesday at 3 p.m. It is unclear if the state’s high school governing body will make any decisions about the fall season.
