The East Carolina game against Marshall, scheduled for Sept. 12 at Dowdy-Ficklen Stadium, has been postponed due to the coronavirus pandemic, ECU announced Thursday.
The Pirates and Thundering Herd hope to reschedule later in 2020.
The game had special significance this year because officials at both schools hope to use it as a tribute to the 75 people who died nearly 50 years ago in the Marshall plane crash.
“We are disappointed that we cannot host Marshall for our season opener, but our top priority remains the health and safety of our student-athletes, coaches, staff, fans and our community,” ECU Athletics Director Jon Gilbert said in a statement. “Mike Hamrick and Marshall have been great to work with as we work to re-schedule the game.”
The game is already around the college football calendar. In February, the NCAA granted both schools an exemption to play their season opener on August 29 – a week earlier than originally planned – due to the historic tribute.
An ordered jet with the Marshall team returned from a game in East Carolina on November 14, 1970, when it collided on a hill two miles from the Tri-State Airport in Kenova, West Virginia. All 75 people on board were killed in the worst disaster in American sports history.
If the teams play this year, it will be the first time East Carolina and Marshall have played since the 2013 season. They once fought each other as rivals of Conference USA, but ECU is now a member of the American Athletic Conference.
The Pirates will now open the 2020 season on September 26 against UCF at Dowdy-Ficklen Stadium, according to a modified AAC schedule released Thursday. The schedule changes affect six league matches. All six matches will be played in the weeks in which they were originally scheduled, but will move to different days in those weeks:
• Houston in Memphis will be played Friday, September 18 (originally scheduled for Saturday, September 19)
• UCF in East Carolina will be played Saturday, September 26 (originally scheduled for Thursday, September 24)
• Memphis at SMU will be played on Saturday, October 3 (originally scheduled for Thursday, October 1)
• SMU in Tulane will be played Friday, October 16 (originally scheduled for Saturday, October 17)
• UCF in Memphis will be played Saturday, October 17 (originally scheduled for Friday, October 16)
• East Carolina in Cincinnati will be played Saturday, November 14th (originally scheduled for Thursday, November 12th)
.
