In stunning college football news, the Michigan State football program announced Friday that the entire team will quarantine for 14 days.
Michigan State statement on quarantine after positive COVID-19 cases
Matt Charboneau of The Detroit News shared the following statement from the team:
“Based on early results from COVID-19 testing conducted over the last week on football staff and student-athletes, which included a second staff member and one student-athlete testing positive on Thursday, all members of the football team will quarantine or isolate, while awaiting complesion of a 14-day quarantine. As part of the athletic department’s return to campus policy, student-athletes quarantine when coming into close contact with an individual who tests positive for COVID-19. The university has designated areas available to house individuals in quarantine as needed based upon the living arrangements for student-athletes. Surveillance testing of student-athletes was completed on Wednesday, July 22 as previously planned, and will be repeated prior to their clearance to return to workouts.”
This news comes on the heels of Thursday’s announcement that workouts had been suspended following a positive COVID-19 test.
2020 College football season in jeopardy?
It also shines a light on just how difficult it may end up being to actually complete the 2020 college football season. Remember, this is happening before most students have even arrived on campus and players are mostly isolated within the program.
Other schools have already made the move to go to online-only learning this fall. This includes the University of California, Berkeley, which determined that fraternity and sorority parties had contributed to an outbreak this summer (more on all that here).
NCAA President Mark Emmert has made it clear that the season is in doubt due to the current COVID-19 caseload in America.
The nation is trending the wrong way, which has caused states like California and Washington to halt all high school sports until December at the earliest.