It will be an interesting week for college football next week or two, as SEC teams may begin to fall camp on Monday and students will soon be back on campus – many are already. Of course, more people throwing back to college towns a new variable in play than it relates to COVID-19.
Alabama students are back in Tuscaloosa, and some of them are gathering outside this weekend – some without masks. The same thing happened at Auburn, as students pulled the ore of a few Tigers players due to a lack of observation of CDC guidelines.
Alabama athletic director Greg Byrne awaited the activities in Tuscaloosa this weekend, and he’s not happy.
“Who wants college sports this fall ?? Of course not these people !! Byrne wrote on Twitter. ‘We need to do better than this for each other and our campus community. Please wear your masks! ”
Who wants college sports this fall ?? ?????????? ??????
Of course not these people !! ???? ??
We need to do better than this for each other and our campus community. Please wear your masks! ?? pic.twitter.com/OAFocYZwin
– Greg Byrne (@Greg_Byrne) August 16, 2020
The photo appears to be from Cecil Hurt of the Tuscaloosa News. The SEC so far has stood its ground on its intentions to continue with the 2020 season, and the league’s schedule will be released on Monday afternoon.
Auburn wide receiver Anthony Schwartz had a similar message to Byrne earlier this weekend.
“You said it’s safer on campus, but I’ve seen crowds of people and none of them have masks,” he said. Schwartz tweeted.
“Don’t get me started on how downtown was yesterday when I went through,” he went on.
Byrne recently spoke with local and national reporters about a Zoom call and reiterated that the SEC intends to play this fall, even after the Big Ten and Pac-12 postponed their seasons last week. The SEC will play a 10-game, only conference schedule that is set to begin on Sept. 26.
“Our goal is to play this fall right now,” Byrne said. “We have been adapting since March, and we will continue to evolve and adapt as needed.”
“We had some positive tests when our student-athletes first came back,” Byrne said. “We have reduced dramatically since they came under our umbrella, and that is good. I’m not a medical expert, but I know myocarditis has been in the news lately. That’s what, in our conversations with our medical team, when we have a student-athlete in our program, we do baseline cardiovascular testing, and that gives us a baseline for all the cardiovascular problems that come with our student-athletes. . And when we do that every now and then, you identify a problem that a student-athlete did not even know they had before they came here.
