Reports: Big Ten to cancel fall football season
COLUMBUS (WCMH) — The Big Ten Conference has voted to cancel the 2020 college football season, according to published reports.
Sources confirmed details of the decision to the Detroit Free Press and the Dan Patrick Show.
The presidents of Big Ten universities met through the weekend to discuss the issue. No official announcements have come out of the weekend meetings, nor have any dates for potential future meetings or announcements.
A source at Ohio State said the school is not aware of a meeting of Big Ten presidents set for Monday evening. Several earlier reports, first reported by the Lansing State Journal, suggested the Big Ten presidents will meet Monday to vote on whether to play football this season.
New reports from the Dan Patrick Show Monday morning said the Big Ten and Pac 12 will cancel their 2020 football seasons in a formal announcement Tuesday.
Patrick said his sources say the ACC and Big 12 are on the fence about canceling while the SEC is trying to get teams to join them for a season.
Ohio State University spokesperson Ben Johnson confirmed that OSU’s incoming president Kristina Johnson represented the university on a call among Big Ten presidents Sunday night. She did not take part in the meeting on Saturday.
Reports coming out of that Saturday meeting indicated a majority of Big Ten presidents want to postpone the football season to 2021. No vote was taken on that conference call.
ESPN, Sports Illustrated, and others are reporting that the Power 5 conference commissioners held an emergency meeting Sunday afternoon on the heels of the Big Ten presidents’ Saturday call.
ESPN is further reporting the Big 10 presidents wanted to gauge if the other Power 5 conferences would “fall in line” with them on the decision to postpone football.
In addition to the Big 10, the Power 5 conferences include the ACC, Big 12, Pac-12, and SEC.
Meanwhile, Sports Illustrated is reporting high-level conference meetings are being planned across college football, with the expectation the season will be postponed to 2021.
The Mid American Conference took the plunge on Saturday, becoming the first FBS conference to cancel the fall sports season. The conference is aiming to move fall sports to the spring.
The Buckeyes returned for fall football camp on Thursday.
On Saturday, the Big Ten announced it has put full contact practice on hold until further notice.
Ohio State is set to begin its 2020 season on Thursday, Sept. 3, against Illinois.