The Miami Hurricanes resumed football workouts Friday but with additional absences
The Miami Hurricanes resumed mandatory football workouts Friday after a one-day stoppage, but those missing from the resumption extended beyond merely the three players who tested positive for COVID-19, according to a school source.
Players who spent at least 15 minutes in close contact with any of the three players who tested positive were told to remain away from the team for at least a week and potentially two weeks, the source said.
UM declined to confirm that because the program, unlike many Power 5 schools, isn’t even confirming if any players tested positive. But the source said a “bunch” of people were told to stay away.
UM confirmed that workouts resumed Friday after saying Thursday’s session was canceled out of “an abundance of caution.”
Several players who were unsure if they had tested positive were told they tested negative, according to a source.
UM athletic director Blake James told WQAM-560 last week that Miami tests student-athletes every “few weeks.” But testing intensified this week with the start of mandatory workouts on Monday. Some players who were tested earlier in the week were retested on Thursday.
The Hurricanes previously announced that student-athletes were being broken into small groups of eight — plus an athletic trainer and strength and conditioning coach — for involuntary workouts that began in June. That approach has continued with the start of mandatory workouts this week, according to the university.
UM previously announced that its plans for dealing with COVID-19 include “baseline testing (including both PCR and serology testing) prior to engaging in organized activity … ability to test for COVID-19 when symptomatic, quarantine and isolation protocols, contact tracing, proper education and accommodations for student-athletes and staff and daily screening and temperature checks.”
On Thursday, the NCAA released a lengthy report detailing recommended guidelines for COVID-19 testing, including 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 said, would test athletes within 72 hours of games along with “officials in football and basketball, due to their close contact with athletes.”
Those recommendations are not required, at least for now.
Atlantic Coast Conference commissioner John Swofford said last week that his league will announce its plans for football by the end of July.
“We’re in crunch time,” James told ESPN’s Paul Finebaum on Friday.
UM’s 2020 season is set to begin Sept. 5 against Temple, but that’s very much in question. The Big 10 and Pacific-12 have canceled non-conference games; the ACC, Big 12 and Southeastern Conference have delayed that decision.
“Today, sadly, the data point in the wrong direction,” NCAA president Mark Emmert told ESPN on Thursday. “If there is to be college sports in the fall, we need to get a much better handle on the pandemic.”
Here’s my Friday piece on Heat guard Tyler Herro.
Here’s my Friday piece with lots of developments on the Dolphins and the NFL season related to COVID-19.
This story was originally published July 17, 2020 at 5:02 PM.
