3/17/2020 baseball Edit

SEC cancels remainder of spring sports

The SEC has canceled the remainder of spring sports. (Christopher Hanewinckel-USA TODAY Sports)

Andrew Hutchinson • HawgBeat

Managing Editor

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Any hope of the SEC’s spring sports resuming at a later date is officially gone.

The conference announced Tuesday that competition has been canceled through the remainder of the academic year because of the coronavirus epidemic. April 15 had been the target date to return, after being pushed back from March 30, but now that won’t happen.

This decision means the baseball, softball, men’s and women’s tennis, men’s and women’s golf, and men’s and women’s outdoor track and field seasons have been called off. They join several winter sports - men’s and women’s basketball, men’s and women’s indoor track and field, gymnastics, and swimming and diving - that didn’t have a full postseason.

A return to play, even in mid-April, always seemed tenuous, especially when the University of Arkansas announced it was shifting all of its classes online for the rest of the semester.

Athletics director Hunter Yurachek also didn’t sound optimistic about the sports resuming when he met with the media Friday - the day the SEC pushed the possible start date back to April 15.

"I think it will be really tough for student-athletes to be away for a month and come back and really get geared back up,” Yurachek said. “What you have to really start to think about - from a student-athlete perspective, as an administrator - is it best to try to piece together a half of a season with no national championship, or is it best…to give each student-athlete a year back, and let them come back and have a full, competitive, championship experience?"

The Division I Council Coordination Committee has already announced it plans to provide eligibility relief for all spring sport athletes, but details have yet to be determined because that would require an expansion of roster and scholarship limitations.

It is unclear how this announcement impacts spring football practices, which were scheduled to begin Monday, but were postponed by the SEC’s suspension of all athletics-related activities through April 15.

There is still a chance practices, meetings and other organized gatherings could resume April 15. However, all spring football games have been canceled.