LANSING, Mich. — “Let’s goooooooo!!!” Tweeted quarterback for the Ohio State Buckeyes Justin Fields, summing up the feelings of many players and fans.
The Big Ten has announced that a fall football season will go on after all. The Big Ten Council of presidents and chancellors voted unanimously to reinstate the fall season starting the weekend of Oct. 23-24. It will consist of an eight-game regular season with a “champion’s week” where the top teams in their divisions will play each other, the second will play each other, the third, and so on down. The sites for these games have not yet been determined.
Not quite five weeks after pushing football and other fall sports to spring in the name of player safety during the pandemic, the conference changed course. Dr. James Borchers, Ohio State Football Head Physician, said that the decision was made only after safety protocols could be firmly established.
Part of those protocols is daily testing, scheduled to start no later than Sept. 30. Anyone who is on the field for a game will require daily antigen testing, including athletes, coaches, and trainers. The Chief Infection Officer will oversee the collection and reporting of data for the Big Ten Conference, which will be paying for the tests.
