Florida State AD: 'God help us' if coronavirus causes cancellation of college football season
A quote from Florida State athletic director David Coburn pretty much sums up what it would mean for college athletics if the coronavirus pandemic caused the cancellation of the college football season.
“God help us.”
According to Warchant.com, Coburn spoke with FSU’s Board of Trustees via teleconference on Friday to detail budgetary contingency plans for the 2020-21 academic year. That includes mapping out what the department’s finances may look like if the football season were canceled.
"I don't think any of them will be pretty," Coburn told the trustees during a video teleconference. "One of them will be a scenario without football. And I would just say God help us if that is the scenario."
With the way collegiate athletics is structured, the absence of college football — even for one season — would be a devastating blow.
Athletic departments are already feeling the effects of winter championships like the NCAA tournament and spring seasons being canceled. The NCAA will distribute $375 million less to its members than it initially planned and things will turn dire financially if there is no college football.
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Football is the financial engine that allows all other college sports to exist. Other than men’s basketball, almost every sport at major universities operates at a deficit — a deficit that is offset by the massive revenue brought in by football through television and media rights, ticket sales, postseason contracts and other avenues.
A recent USA Today analysis concluded that “at least $4.1 billion” is at stake for the 2020-21 fiscal year among public schools in Power Five conferences if there is no football. And that doesn’t even account for the economic impact that would be felt in college towns across the country that depend on revenue from football fans flooding in on Saturdays in the fall.
In recent weeks, especially after Vice President Mike Pence’s call with the College Football Playoff management committee, it has become increasingly clear that football cannot be played without students on campus for the fall semester. After all, as Big 12 commissioner Bob Bowlsby told Yahoo Sports’ Pete Thamel earlier this month, the participants of college football are students.
Several alternatives are being discussed at the highest levels of college athletics. Some have even floated the idea of starting the season in the spring. No matter how it’s done, universities will do whatever it takes to make sure a season is played. As Coburn’s quote alluded to, there’s just too much financial devastation that would emerge otherwise.
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