NCAA football postpones numerous games due to COVID-19

More than 100 college football games have been cancelled or postponed due to the astonishing number of COVID-19 cases dismantling the U.S. every day.

In the U.S. alone, 13.4 million people have been infected with the virus, with a death toll standing at 267,000 and rising quickly.

Due to certain student privacy laws, many schools won’t disclose COVID-19 test data.

Notre Dame, Duke, Arizona State, UCLA, LSU and Texas A&M are among the numerous schools not providing data on COVID-19.  

Thousands of fans were disappointed to see that the Clemson-Florida State game had been postponed when a Clemson offensive lineman tested positive for COVID-19 the day before.

It was one of 18 games that were postponed last week due to the pandemic.

Despite their offensive lineman being infected with COVID-19, Clemson officials still wanted to play the football game.

Obviously, the Florida State Seminoles did not feel comfortable playing, which led the game to be postponed for a later date.

Clemson head coach, Dabo Swinney, disagreed with the decision to cancel the game and believes Florida State used COVID-19 as an excuse to not play.  

“This game was not canceled because of Covid,” Swinney said. “Covid was just an excuse to cancel the game. I have no doubt their players wanted to play and would have played. And same with the coaches. To me, Florida State administration forfeited the game.”

Swinney’s main priority is winning. His player’s safety takes a back seat when on the football field. 

Mike Norvell, head coach for Florida State, is focused on keeping his players safe and is following all safety protocols to ensure they stay safe.

“To that I’ll say that everyone here wanted to go out and compete,” said Norvell. “The protocols and procedures that are in place to ensure the safety of our student athletes is something that we don’t take lightly.” 

“The fact that a symptomatic player practiced throughout the week and made the trip to Tallahassee raised a lot of concerns,” Norvell said. “Everyone can handle things differently in their programs. We are concerned about our players being protected.”

Norvell ensured the game was postponed due to the virus, and not due to Swinney’s immature accusation.

“We love this game, but it’s not worth it compromising the right thing, doing the right thing, and putting these guys at risk. We are going to continue to operate at those standards,” Norvell said.

Norvell hopes to make up the Clemson game in two weeks, as do a lot of different schools.

Surprisingly, the Atlantic Coast Conference  did not add any response or clarity to the situation between Clemson and Florida.

Most people expected a statement to follow the next day. It’s strange to see no response toward Swinney’s interview after he basically dismantled the legitimacy of the testing system.  

Although the reasoning behind the silence is unclear, it isn’t crazy to question whether Clemson’s winning history and importance to the conference is what swayed the ACC’s decision to stay silent.

College teams need to work together for sports to continue instead of illegitimating a pandemic that has killed over a million people worldwide.

Nick Despotakis can be reached at [email protected] or nick__despo on Twitter.