Miami Hurricanes administration would support spring college football season if necessary
The Miami Hurricanes, like all college football programs, hope the season can begin on time amid the coronavirus pandemic.
But UM athletic director Blake James indicated Friday that he would be fine pushing the start of the season back to as late as February if needed.
A February through May college football season would potentially conflict with the men’s and women’s NCAA basketball tournaments and baseball season, among other sports. But that wouldn’t appear to be a major concern to athletic directors who desperately need the money generated by football.
“My plan and my belief is we are going to play a football season next year,” James told WQAM-560’s Joe Rose and Zach Krantz. “My hope is we are on the schedule we have scheduled right now. If someone said to me you have to start football season in October, November, December, January, February, whatever it is to get it in next year, that is something we would want to do and want to have in place.”
James said there have been informal discussions about moving the season, but it’s premature to make any decision.
“Given we are five months away from the season it’s too early to say `This is going to happen or this needs to happen,’” James said. “Right now, we’re committed to doing everything we need to do as part of this community to bring an end to this pandemic.”
James said he and coach Manny Diaz “have talked about what would it look like if we started fall camp right on time to if we had to push fall camp [to later on]. I’ve even had conversations with colleagues around the country about what if we moved the college football season out. There hasn’t been any talks I’ve been a part of about canceling the season. Are we talking potential scenarios? Yeah.
“Everyone I’ve talked with is committed to having our sports back on as soon as possible, but most importantly everyone is focused on bringing an end to this pandemic.”
James said 75 to 80 percent of UM’s annual athletic department revenue comes from football.
James also spoke of how galvanizing a return of Hurricanes football would be, but only if health officials determine it’s safe and coronavirus isn’t impacting everyday life.
“Hurricane football is an important part of this community,” he said.
Earlier this week, Pac-12 commissioner Larry Scott told Bayareanewsgroup.com that the end of May is the approximate deadline to determine the direction of the college football season.
“The optimistic model has an elongated training camp and on-time start [to the season],” Scott said. “The most pessimistic has no season at all.”
Last week, Big 12 commissioner Bob Bowlsby said the next 60-to-90 days would determine if there was a football season and admitted “the fall is in jeopardy.”
James addressed other issues with WQAM:
▪ He said every Atlantic Coast Conference school lost $2.3 million in annual revenue from the cancellation of the men’s and women’s NCAA basketball tournaments.
“That’s a significant hit,” James said. “Give credit to our ACC conference leadership. They’re working on helping the schools ease that pain.
“We’ll make the best of what happens, appreciate our conference leadership working with the conference budget to try and ease that pain.”
▪ He said the NCAA will permit baseball programs to exceed the 11.7 annual scholarship limit only for seniors who have been granted an extra year of eligibility because of the pandemic.
“For everyone else you still have to be within that 11.7 (limit),” he said.
▪ James said school president Julio Frenk indicated during a town hall meeting with UM employees on Wednesday night that “his priority is keeping in place all the current employees that we have, not to have layoffs or furloughs.”
OFFENSIVE LINE NEWS
Offensive line coach Garin Justice said there hasn’t been a decision about whether junior DJ Scaife will play tackle or guard, and he believes he would be fine with either position.
Scaife began last season as the starter at right guard but moved to right tackle in the second game and stayed there for the remainder of the season, starting all 13 games.
“I think the issue people have with DJ is Scaife is such a very, very well rounded offensive lineman physically as far as what he can do,” Justice said.
“He’s a guy who is long and athletic enough to play at tackle, but also has a good enough base and is physical and strong enough to be an inside player. A guy like DJ is someone that you want to recruit because as an offensive line coach you’re trying to find your best five guys and fit them in the puzzle, put the best five guys on the field. …
“We want to try and do everything we can to cross train these guys where they can play multiple positions. DJ I see as a proven guy that has played here that you can plug into a spot you feel you need help at. How that ties into guys like Kai (Herbert) and Zion and Campbell and some of those tackles is the fact I feel we have some tackle bodies who are capable. Not saying we don’t at guard, but I’m trying to put the best five guys I think we have on the field.”
▪ Justice said he has been encouraged by the progress of junior tackle Kai-Leon Herbert, who arrived in 2017 as a ballyhooed four-star recruit out of Plantation American Heritage but hasn’t started a single game.
“I’m encouraged with Kai,” he said. “Kai needs to keep going along with the process, keep developing confidence. He hasn’t had a lot of the success he wants to, but that doesn’t mean he’s not a good player. He was taking some steps in the right direction. He’s sending me videos of him doing stuff, and you can see a drive, a determination of what he’s wanting to do. He’s doing everything in his power to be a great player.”
▪ Justice also made clear he likes the skill set of John Campbell, who was the first-team left tackle in the four spring practices. Colleagues Susan Miller Degnan and David Wilson have more of what Justice had to say here.
Here’s my Friday Heat notebook, with news from Erik Spoelstra.
Please check back later today for my Dolphins post.
This story was originally published April 3, 2020 at 3:01 PM.
