Pac-12 and Big Ten are first major conferences to call off college football season and other fall sports

• The NCAA's Big Ten and Pac-12 have canceled their 2020 college football seasons.
• Chancellors and presidents from the schools in both conferences met in recent days to discuss their paths forward, but forging on through the coronavirus pandemic proved too logistically challenging.
• The decisions came after six Big Ten schools had been forced to alter their offseason programs due to COVID-19 outbreaks and case counts have skyrocketed on the West Coast.
• With just three Power 5 conferences remaining — two of which appear to be considering calling off football for the year as well — the 2020 college football season appears to be on the brink of falling apart.

Two of college football's biggest power players have scrapped their plans for the 2020 season.

The Big Ten and Pac-12 have officially canceled college football for their conferences mere days after touting updated schedules for the upcoming season. Chancellors and presidents from the schools met in recent days to discuss a potential path forward, but forging on through the coronavirus pandemic proved too logistically challenging to overcome.

"The health, safety and well-being of our student-athletes and all those connected to Pac-12 sports has been our number one priority since the start of this current crisis," Pac-12 Commissioner Larry Scott said in the conference's statement Tuesday afternoon. "Our student-athletes, fans, staff and all those who love college sports would like to have seen the season played this calendar year as originally planned, and we know how disappointing this is."

Hours prior, the Big Ten announced its decision to postpone in its own statement.

"Our primary responsibility is to make the best possible decisions in the interest of our students, faculty, and staff," Morton Schapiro, Chair of the Big Ten Council of Presidents/Chancellors and Northwestern University President.

"The mental and physical health and welfare of our student-athletes has been at the center of every decision we have made regarding the ability to proceed forward," Big Ten Commissioner Kevin Warren added. "As time progressed and after hours of discussion with our Big Ten Task Force for Emerging Infectious Diseases and the Big Ten Sports Medicine Committee, it became abundantly clear that there was too much uncertainty regarding potential medical risks to allow our student-athletes to compete this fall."

Both conferences left open the possibility of spring competition for all of the sports typically played in the fall. Leadership has yet to make a decision regarding the future of the winter and spring sports in the Big Ten, but Pac-12 teams will not play until January 1, 2021 at the earliest.

Dan Patrick reported Monday that representatives from 12 out of the 14 Big Ten schools voted this weekend to postpone the conference's 2020 season. Nebraska and Iowa were the only schools that voted in favor of playing this fall.

The decision to push off play comes just days after student-athletes unified to issue demands about the upcoming season and beyond to leadership in both conferences. In a letter published in The Players Tribune, "hundreds" of players in the Pac-12 threatened to boycott if the conference did not address issues of racial and economic inequity in collegiate athletics as well as concerns about health and safety measures meant to protect athletes during the coronavirus crisis.

Athletes in the Big Ten quickly followed suit, penning their own list of demands for leaders of their conference under the title #BigTenUnited. And on Sunday, some of the biggest names in college football — including Clemson Tigers quarterback Trevor Lawrence — banded together to declare their desire to play this year, but only if safety protocols are met and the NCAA moves towards creating a players association for student-athletes.

It's no surprise the Big Ten would be amongst the first of college football's major conferences to pull the plug on the upcoming season. Six of its member programs — including Ohio State, Maryland, Indiana, Michigan State, Rutgers, and Northwestern — had already been forced to alter their offseason programs due to COVID-19 outbreaks within their ranks.

Just last week, the Scarlet Knights announced that 28 members of their team had tested positive for COVID-19 after a group of players had attended a party on campus. New Jersey health commissioner Judith Persichilli described Rutgers as one of several instances in which "indoor and outdoor gatherings in our state have led to community clusters of COVID-19."

"Nobody wanted to be the first to do it," a coach of one of the Power 5's teams told ESPN. "Now, nobody will want to be the last."

While football teams in the Pac-12 have not yet seen coronavirus outbreaks on par with those on some squads in the Big Ten, they face their own challenges relating to the pandemic. Many states on the West Coast — including California, Washington, and Arizona — have seen significant upticks in COVID-19 cases in the past few weeks. Given that eight of the Pac-12's teams are based in the three aforementioned states, the coronavirus surge would undoubtedly complicate the safety of inter-state travel for games across the conference.

The NCAA's Divsion II and Division III programs had already resolved to cancel all fall sports championships in light of the pandemic. Several smaller conferences in Division I had followed their lead, with the Mid-American Conference announcing Saturday that the fall sports season would be postponed.

Though they have yet to officially cancel their seasons, the Big 12, SEC, and ACC — which comprise the remaining three Power 5 conferences — face similar roadblocks in returning to the gridiron. COVID-19 cases have exploded across the South, and some member schools have seen outbreaks similar to those within the Big Ten.

Patrick reported Monday that representatives from the Big 12 and ACC were "on the fence" regarding whether or not to continue pursuing football this fall. The SEC appears to be the only conference unwavering in its commitment to playing in the immediate future, but whether or not it will be possible to pull off safely remains to be seen.

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