Big Ten football programs are going to have to wait a little longer than previously thought to get back onto the practice field.
Friday afternoon, the conference announced that it was extending its suspension of organized team activities through at least Monday, May 4.
Previously, the league office had banned activities effective through April 6.
The ban on all on-and-off-campus recruiting activities has also been extended.
Despite those restrictions, Ohio State has still managed to land several major commitments in recent weeks.
Wednesday, OSU head coach Ryan Day said they’re taking advantage of technology to keep in contact with their recruits during this unusual time.
“We’re doing the best we can to communicate with the families, using FaceTime and different things to communicate and try to answer their questions the best we can even though, right now, they’re not able to visit on campus,” Day said.
The NCAA may ultimately have to figure out whether there’s a way to make up for this lost practice time. But Day said right now, it was too early to tell how they might solve that issue.
“Once we know when we’re going to kind of get back into this thing, then we’ll try to come up with something. And I think one of the models that we need to consider is some sort of OSP or OTA models that were out there in the NFL. But until we kind of know what the parameters are, it’s hard to create anything.”
You can find the Big Ten’s complete statement below.
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The Big Ten Conference announced today that it will extend the previously announced suspension of all organized team activities through May 4, 2020 and will re-evaluate again at that time.
This is an additional measure to the previously announced cancellation of all conference and non-conference competitions through the end of the academic year, including spring sports that compete beyond the academic year. The Conference also has previously announced a moratorium on all on- and off-campus recruiting activities for the foreseeable future.
The Big Ten Conference will continue to use this time to work with the appropriate medical experts and institutional leadership to determine next steps relative to the COVID-19 pandemic.
The main priority of the Big Ten Conference is to ensure the health, safety and wellness of our student-athletes, coaches, administrators, faculty, fans and media as we continue to monitor all developing and relevant information on the COVID-19 virus.