HEADLINE

Big 12 marching forward; decision on fans up to each university

Field Level Media

August 12, 2020 at 11:48 pm.

A revised 10-game schedule was released by the Big 12 Conference on Wednesday.

The schedule culminates with the Dr. Pepper Big 12 Championship game, to be played Dec. 12 or Dec. 19.

Commissioner Bob Bowlsby said Wednesday the conference included at least two players from every team in the health and safety discussions surrounding competing amid the COVID-19 pandemic. Bowlsby said he expects greater clarity on the season as a whole next week when the College Football Playoff committee meets.

“It will be a while into season before all of this is resolved. No obvious reason why it couldn’t work,” Bowlsby said of a season-ending playoff.

The Big 12 met Tuesday and confirmed it would move forward with plans to play the 2020 college football season. The move was not unanimous, according to Baylor officials, and came on the same day the Big Ten and Pac-12 postponed their football seasons with a goal of playing in the spring.

The Big 12 will test players for the virus three days each week, Bowlsby said.

The next big question for Big 12 schools is whether to permit fans in the stadium on game day. Bowlsby said each institution will make the decision on stadium capacity under guidelines from state and local government.

“Fans of college football are a huge part of game day. I think we all agree that we’re not going to have full stadiums,” Bowlsby said.

Texas and Oklahoma are scheduled to play at the Cotton Bowl on Oct. 10.

The first week confirmed on the schedule is Sept. 26 and includes all conference games. All nonconference games are to be announced by each member institution and are required to be played before Sept. 26.

Each team will have a minimum of two bye dates and potentially a third bye late in the season.

“I had been very hopeful that the Big 12 would come to this decision,” Texas coach Tom Herman said. “Our guys are really excited.

“We understand all of the health and safety challenges and appreciate everything our medical team is doing here, but probably the worst thing about all of this has been the uncertainty. It has been very hard on our players mentally, and they’ve done a great job fighting through it.

“When the conference comes out and says, ‘We’re committed to finding every way possible that we can play this season,’ I think that gives them a lot of pride, and it gives them a lot of confidence that, if they come out here and do what they’re supposed to do, they’re going to get to play this great game that they love.”

Reports that Nebraska — which hopes to play despite the Big Ten’s decision — would be included in the Big 12 conference schedule were unfounded. The Cornhuskers are not listed on any team’s schedule released Wednesday. Bowlsby said Nebraska hadn’t reached out to the league as of Wednesday.