Miami Hurricanes test positive for COVID-19. And NCAA releases these strict guidelines
The coronavirus has made its way into the University of Miami football program.
The Miami Herald has learned that at least three players have tested positive for COVID-19, prompting the Hurricanes to cancel their mandatory workouts on Thursday.
Per school policy, UM declined to confirm whether any players have tested positive.
“Out of an abundance of caution and in coordination with our return to campus policy, we elected to postpone today’s workout,” UM told the Herald.
These are UM’s first known positive coronavirus tests among football players. Two sources said the team had to return for more tests Thursday.
UM athletic director Blake James previously said the school is not releasing the number of positive tests among student-athletes because it would cause more confusion. Multiple sources had said the football players had all tested negative in previous weeks.
UM began mandatory football workouts Monday, with players working in small groups believed to be no more than eight players.
On Thursday afternoon, the NCAA released a lengthy report detailing recommended guidelines for COVID-19 testing and offering ways to assist schools in providing “a healthy and safe environment’’ for athletes. The document details “key” protocols that include weekly testing, 10-day isolation for athletes who have tested positive with no symptoms (longer isolation for those with symptoms) and mandatory 14-day quarantine for close contacts of the athletes who tested positive.
A close contact, per the report, is someone who has been within six feet of the infected athlete for at least 15 minutes. The 14-day quarantine without competition for those teammates who have had close contact with the infected person would be carried out even if the close contact tested negative for the virus.
And “close contact” could be a member of the opposing team.
“High-contact risk sports,’’ the NCAA report cities, would test athletes within 72 hours of games with “officials in football and basketball, due to their close contact with athletes,’’ also tested. Additionally, the document states that “testing protocols should address student-athletes, plus all inner bubble personnel (coaches, medical staff, officials and other essential personnel) for whom physical distancing, masking and other protective features are not maintained.”
NCAA president Mark Emmert said the document released Thursday “lays out the advice of health care professionals as to how to resume college sports if we can achieve an environment where COVID-19 rates are manageable.”
Added Emmert: “Today, sadly, the data point in the wrong direction. If there is to be college sports in the fall, we need to get a much better handle on the pandemic.”
The document details several scenarios that could result in a school considering “pausing or discontinuing athletic activities,’’ including “campuswide or local community test rates that are considered unsafe by local public health officials” and “local public health officials stating that there is an inability for the hospital infrastructure to accommodate a surge in hospitalizations related to Covid-19.’’
Those would be especially concerning to areas such as South Florida, among the nation’s leaders in coronavirus cases.
Atlantic Coast Conference commissioner John Swofford said last week that the conference will announce by the end of July its plans for football.
UM’s 2020 season was set to begin Sept. 5 against Temple, but that seems highly unlikely now, as the ACC could eliminate all nonconference opponents except Notre Dame, which belongs to the league in all sports except football. There are other ACC scenarios for 2020 being discussed, including one reported by David Teel of the Richmond Times-Dispatch that includes the 14 ACC teams plus Notre Dame dividing into three geographic pods of five.
In that scenario, teams would play each pod rival twice, then possibly add two more games against an SEC team to preserve several annual ACC-SEC in-state rivalries (e.g. Florida State-Florida, Georgia Tech-Georgia). For UM, that geographic proposal isn’t exactly wonderful, as the nearest ACC competitor is Florida State in Tallahassee, 487 miles away, and there are no annual Canes rivalry games against SEC teams.
Major League Baseball has also instituted a geographic system for this season, with the Miami Marlins only playing teams from the NL East and AL East.
This story was originally published July 16, 2020 at 12:11 PM.
