Clemson Football: ACC needs to clarify cancellation protocols

Clemson football needs clarity from the ACC as we head into the start of the season

We’re just a week out from the scheduled start of the 2020 Clemson football season and there are still questions to be answered.

Clemson Athletics released its weekly COVID-19 testing results and announced that 14 student-athletes and four staffers- 18 total- across all of the fall sports had tested positive for the virus. While that percentage is still minuscule- 2.66 percent- and we don’t know exactly how many Clemson football players tested positive, it still brings up a question that needs to be answered by the ACC before the season start:

What constitutes a postponement or cancellation?

Is it one test? If so, one test among 85+ athletes and their staffers is likely to happen sooner rather than later- especially with students returning to campus across the country.

If it’s not one positive test, then how many? What’s the threshold? What if the test happens on a Monday rather than a Friday? How does that play into the decision of playing a game or not?

How much contact tracing must be done?  What if a positional unit is completely depleted due to contact tracing?

The Clemson football season will not work without a clear plan moving forward

The Big 12 was the first conference to release its guidelines for cancellations and for games to be played. The conference says that a team must have at least 53 players available- that counts walk-ons- and they have minimums for each position. If a team is short at a position, it can still choose to play if it so chooses to put other players at that position.

If a game has to be postponed and isn’t able to be made up for whatever reason, it will be marked as a ‘no contest.’

These are questions that need to be answered before the season begins- and, as we all know, that’s next week.

The ACC’s season technically begins Thursday, Sept. 10 with UAB at Miami and we need to see these questions answered.

If a single positive test, or even a small number, constitutes postponements and shut downs- and it has in MLB and in several College Football programs during preseason workouts- then we won’t see this season played to its completion.

That’s the tricky part of playing this year, for sure, and these programs are looking to their conference medical advisory teams for guidance and protocols. Those questions- especially the barometer for how many tests constitute a shutdown- need to be answered.

The Clemson football team opens up the 2020 season on the road against the Wake Forest Demon Deacons next Saturday. The game will be televised live at 7:30 p.m. on ABC.