D4 eZ sU the washington post.friday, march 13 , 2020
while his team wound up quaran-
tined for about 90 minutes in its
locker room. Hoiberg had looked
miserably ill during the game and
had exited the court four minutes
before the finish. He a nd Nebraska
had released a statement saying he
had been diagnosed with the flu,
not the coronavirus.
“When I woke up this morning,”
Warren said, “even more than I did
yesterday, I just felt in my spirit
that this was the right thing.”
ACC Commissioner John Swof-
ford decided likewise roughly an
hour after holding a news confer-
ence to announce games still
would be played. The official an-
nouncement came less than
12 hours after the ACC had
planned to conduct the rest of the
tournament, beginning with
Thursday’s quarterfinals, without
fans at Greensboro Coliseum even
as the NBA said it would be sus-
pending its season.
The move marks the first time
the ACC tournament has been can-
celed in its 67-year history.
To p-seeded florida State, was
presented the conference trophy
in a surreal ceremony on the court
only minutes before the first quar-
terfinal game was scheduled to
tip-off.
“We believe it’s the right deci-
sion to make at this particular
time,” Swofford said. “You could
ask why was it not made sooner.
It’s a fair question. The answer is
that it’s an extraordinarily fluid
situation with information com-
ing to us that changes — I used to
say by the week, then I said by the
day, and now I say by the hour.
“Hopefully w e’re doing the right
thing in the context of this great
country of ours and in the context
of intercollegiate sports.”
At the Big East, Ackerman said
the league did not consider cancel-
ing the game before it began, even
as news of other conferences can-
celing their tournaments rolled in
while Creighton and St. John’s
players warmed up.
“It was just our view — we didn’t
feel like we needed a dramatic,
pull-the-players-off-the-court-in-
the-middle-of-the-game gesture,”
she said in a news conference.
“folks were here, we just literally
didn’t think that an extra 15,
20 minutes of game time was go-
ing to make that much of a differ-
ence. That said, we didn’t think it
was appropriate to send the ath-
letes back out on the floor during
halftime. So it was a judgment call
that we made.”
[email protected]
[email protected]Wallace reported from new york. gene
Wang in greensboro, n.c., and emily
giambalvo in Washington contributed
to this report.The coronavirus outbreak
The NCAA made the unprece-
dented decision at the end of a
dizzying day of cancellations
across college basketball and the
sports world. A riptide of coronavi-
rus-related decisions began in late
morning when a slew of Division I
conferences canceled their basket-
ball tournaments minutes apart,
continued in early afternoon as
the Big East in New York followed
after one half of play and persisted
across the day as schools nation-
wide a nnounced the suspension of
all athletic events and travel.
“I’m going to speak from the
heart a little bit here: This has
been the most extraordinary
stretch of days I’ve ever had or
seen in my 30 -plus years of work-
ing in t he sports business,” s aid Big
East Commissioner Val Acker-
man, a former basketball player at
Virginia, who soon added, “my
prediction is if things escalate in
this country, as we’ve seen in other
parts of the world, I suspect it’s
going to be very difficult for them
to hold on to the NCAA tourna-
ment as planned.”
reaction tore through coaches
and the rosters. Gonzaga Coach
mark few, whose team figured to
have a No. 1 seed in the men’s
tournament, heard t he news while
on air with ESPN’s rece Davis and
expressed disappointment that a
postponement apparently
couldn’t work. ron Harper Jr., the
rutgers sophomore forward
whose program was headed for its
first berth since 1991, tweeted
“# marchSadness” and “It wasn’t
supposed to go down like this.”
Kansas Coach Bill Self, who fig-
ured to have the No. 1 overall seed,
said in a statement, “While we are
disappointed for the players, it
was the right and necessary thing
to do.” michigan State Coach To m
Izzo referred to beloved senior
Cassius Winston and called his
team meeting “a tear-jerking mo-
ment.”
Stars tweeted. Sophomore
guard Tre Jones of Duke: “Doesn’t
seem real, still.” Junior forward
Jordan Nwora of Louisville: “This
is tough for real.” Senior guard
myles Powell of Seton Hall: “Dear
Seton Hall, I love you.”
Players for the top-ranked
women’s team, South Carolina,
ncaa from D1
Virus fears
force NCAA
to cancel its
tournaments
stood the importance of prioritiz-
ing the health of those involved.
Speaking at a news conference
in Indianapolis, Big Ten Commis-
sioner Kevin Warren, who began
his job in June, said, “I’ve just
found over my career [in sports
and law], the more complicated
decisions are, the answer is much
more s imple, and this is just, ‘What
is the right thing to do?’ ” He said,
“I think the biggest thing was the
uncertainty. This is one of those
situations t hat a lot of people were
telling me, ‘I don’t know.’ ”
About the change in course
from Wednesday, he said, “I don’t
think anything changed. Quite
naturally, this is something that
I’ve been evaluating over the last
six weeks.... I spent a lot of time
thinking through this, meditating
on it and really this morning pray-
ing over what is best.”
About the brief appearance of
the michigan and rutgers players,
he said, “I had to make sure that I
was comfortable, that I had spo-
ken to the appropriate people” —
meaning chancellors, presidents
and athletic directors.
Warren said the strange events
of late Wednesday night had been
“one piece of the decision-making
process” but not a deciding one.
Just after Indiana and Nebraska
finished the two-game evening,
Nebraska Coach fred Hoiberg
wound up examined in a hospitalmotional sign reading, “march Is
on.”
Inside that arena, where one
electronic sign advises it’s
336 days until the home of the
Indiana Pacers hosts the NBA All-
Star Weekend, the late morning
went by at a hushed court with
only a row of reporters and various
team and conference officials mill-
ing around. Then the michigan
team entered the court, and in a
feat of wit, sophomore Brandon
Johns Jr. and junior Isaiah Livers
raised their arms toward the seats
as if playing to the nonexistent
cheering.
The team began warming up,
and then the rutgers team
emerged. Within minutes, their
exercise stopped, a small buzz
went through the arena, and they
all exited the court.
The maryland Te rrapins’ flight
to Indianapolis was scheduled to
take off at 3:15 p.m., with the team
originally scheduled to open play
friday evening in the tournament
quarterfinals.
Anthony Cowan Jr.’s father said
his son, the Te rps’ senior point
guard, felt dejected and confused
upon h earing the n ews that the Big
Te n tournament had been scut-
tled. “We’re not s ure what happens
next,” s aid t he elder A nthony C ow-
an, who had a flight to Indianapo-
lis scheduled for friday at 6 a.m.
The father added that he under-begin at 7 p.m.
Awkwardness cloaked venues
such as the Big Te n and the ACC.
Shortly after michigan and then
rutgers players had taken the
court at Bankers Life fieldhouse
here to warm up for their noon
game at the Big Te n tournament,
the word came and prompted
them to exit the court for their
locker rooms.
Before the ACC tournament
was canceled, the florida State
and Clemson bands played at that
event’s site, the Greensboro (N.C.)
Coliseum, in advance of a game
scheduled to go on without fans in
the stands, as had been previously
decreed Wednesday. ESPN’s Jay
Bilas later reported that the con-
testants for the second game,
Duke and N.C. State, did not in-
tend to play as scheduled.
In d owntown Indianapolis, fans
here and there loaded up cars to
depart, including one group wear-
ing michigan State gear. They
would depart a tournament that
held only two games, both on
Wednesday night.
By Thursday morning, the day
after the Big Te n said the remain-
der of the event would be held
without fans, hotels once primed
for hubbub became ghostly. The
sidewalks outside Bankers Life
fieldhouse were empty around 10
a.m., a group of police officers
standing outside beneath a pro-tweeted, “This is so unbelievable”
(Brea Beal), and, “So heartbroken
for our seniors” (Destiny Little-
ton), and, “Unsettling and devas-
tating but the absolute best deci-
sion for all” ( Coach Dawn Staley).
Geno Auriemma, coach of the
Connecticut women’s team, told
ESPN earlier in the day, “ The min-
ute I read that one of the [NBA]
players had tested positive” — a
reference to Utah’s r udy Gobert —
“I thought that was the beginning
of the end.”
Hofstra’s men’s basketball
team, which had booked passage
to a first NCAA tournament since
2001, tweeted a teary emoji.
By that point, 22 conferences
had canceled basketball tourna-
ments — men’s, women’s or both.
Before they did, an odd array of
scenes played out at venues.
The Big East played one half of
its first quarterfinal, between
Creighton and St. John’s, at madi-
son Square Garden in New York
before ceasing. Each participating
Big East school was initially al-
lowed 200 tickets for friends and
family to attend Thursday, and
attendees were instructed t o sit on
one side of the arena, with the
other half already sanitized. Al-
though the Big East sold separate
tickets for its day and night ses-
sions Thursday, attendees had
been told they were free to stay at
the arena for the later games, set tomichael conroy/associated press
bankers Life Fieldhouse in Indianapolis cleared out after the big Ten became the latest conference to cancel its basketball tournaments.several days, at least.
The end of this NBA season
was shaping up to be a good one,
but now we must pause. It’s
appropriate. We can argue about
whether to play or chill with any
league around the world right
now, and we can lament the
thrills we’re going to miss. But
consider what we’re gaining:
awareness.
Getting more people to take
the coronavirus seriously is a
very good thing, an essential
thing, a challenging thing to do
when people can escape
mindlessly. moving forward,
sports leagues must use their
platforms and become leaders in
changing indifferent attitudes.
That should include olympic
organizers, too. And they must
do so with an unprecedented
level of uniformity.
During the news conference,
Inslee pulled out his cellphone
and read a text message from a
woman in Italy for emphasis.
“Stop saying it’s just flu or
severe flu,” I nslee read. “Please
come and see our intensive care
units in northern Italy. People
can’t breathe, and we don’t have
anywhere to put them. You
[expletive] idiots.”
It doesn’t have to get to such a
panicked point here, but plenty
of experts are pleading for
immediate action. In the sports
world, we shouldn’t be focused
merely on the roll call of who’s
playing and what the emotional
and financial costs will be.
There’s also the civic
responsibility to spread a
beneficial message to people who
might need a better perspective.
That’s the hidden power of
sports, a power reserved for the
most critical issues and
moments. If a global health crisis
doesn’t provide the inspiration to
be more than a money-printing
diversion, then these games
aren’t worthy of all the attention.
[email protected]For more by Jerry Brewer, visit
washingtonpost.com/brewer.tens of millions of dollars per
team — I’m sure NBA
Commissioner Adam Silver
wishes his league could have
made a decision before Gobert
and Jazz teammate Donovan
mitchell tested positive and
forced a hiatus. And this isn’t a
vacation. Now comes the
complicated process of retracing
Gobert’s steps and figuring out if
the virus spread over about a
two-week period, which will
involve closely monitoring and
requesting self-quarantine of the
players and staffs of all of U tah’s
recent opponents and all of those
opponents’ opponents. most of
the league will be affected forweapons, and that was not a very
comfortable time, and I was
really little. But I know my mom
was really, really scared.
“But this is something that you
can’t see.... We have very
intelligent scientists and doctors
and people that are in charge of
this kind of thing, and the
American people have been very
resilient over the years, and I
think we’ll come out of this
thing, but this is a scary time
period.”
The sports world is beginning
to respond appropriately to the
concern. It took too much time,
however. Despite all the factors
involved — including the loss ofCarolina Coach roy Williams try
to talk through it.
“This is the most serious
problem that I can remember in
our country that there’s no
answer for,” t he 69-year-old
coach said after the Ta r Heels
were eliminated from the ACC
tournament Wednesday night.
“This is the possibility of
people getting very sick and
dying, and it’s something that in
my mind is more serious than
anything I can remember, and
I’m way older than most of you
guys. I remember when I was
little that people were preparing
places for you to go and hide
underground because of nuclearWashington state had just more
than 100 confirmed cases of the
virus. That number rose to 366
on Wednesday. There were
17 deaths six days ago. The latest
total is 29.
Earlier this week, a model
predicting the spread of the virus
and its impact on local King and
Snohomish counties was
released. The research was done
by an acclaimed trio of
researchers: the fred
Hutchinson Cancer research
Center, the Bill and melinda
Gates foundation and the
Institute for Disease modeling in
Bellevue, Wash. Their study
anticipates that, if the area can’t
slow the spread of the virus,
there would be 25,000 infected
citizens and 400 deaths by
April 7, which is less than a
month from now. This is why
Inslee and governors across the
country are using their powers to
ban large events and promote
social distancing.
overblown? That’s a common
reaction from people who just
want us to stop being scared and
keep living. American pride can
trick us into believing we are too
mighty to suffer the way China or
Italy has. But we’re playing from
behind. If we don’t get proactive,
there’s ample evidence the virus
will spread in devastating ways.
Jeffrey S. Duchin, the chief
health officer for Seattle and
King County, provided a grim
analogy that should create
urgency.
“This large-scale outbreak will
go on for weeks and likely for
months,” he said. “We expect this
will be a very difficult time. It’s
similar to what you might think
of as an infectious-disease
equivalent of a major earthquake
that’s going to shake us for weeks
and weeks.”
If Duchin isn’t famous enough
for you, listen to TNT NBA
analyst Charles Barkley, whose
employer was set to televise the
NCAA men’s tournament, calling
for march madness to be shut
down. or listen to NorthWe often celebrate the
diversion of sports and seek that
opportunity to escape. We can
get overly protective of this
diversion, acting as if it is our
right and growing angry
whenever anything disturbs the
obsession. But these games aren’t
always a magic safe place in
which real life doesn’t e xist. They
don’t just divert. They e xemplify
society. They magnify it. They
amplify it. Because we’re so
intensely interested, they have
the power to send messages that
large portions of the population
might not receive otherwise, and
they can do it in a more
convincing manner.
In the United States, the
current hope should be that
sports can make people wake up
and live with appropriate
concern and diligence. While
there’s nothing wrong with being
grumpy that the coronavirus is
interrupting the sports schedule,
we must also think about it this
way: Athletics are ubiquitous —
always on, always entertaining,
something you can set your clock
to — and when they’re not, we
should be more concerned than
frustrated. To disrupt sports, it
takes great tragedy, war or crisis.
It’s unreasonable for anyone to
deny that this is one of those
frightening times.
“This is an unprecedented
public health situation, and we
can’t wait until we’re in the
middle of it to slow it down,”
Washington Gov. Jay Inslee (D)
said during a Wednesday news
conference. “We’ve got to get
ahead of the curve. one main
defense is to reduce the
interaction of people in our
lives.”
I live in Seattle, 12 miles from
Kirkland, Wash., which has been
dubbed the U.S. epicenter of the
coronavirus. It feels as if we
reside in America’s future unless
it becomes proactive about
preventing the spread of the
contagious covid-19. Six days ago,
brewer from D1
Jerry Brewer
Sports o≠er an escape, but they also can set an example when real life intervenes
patrick smith/agence-France presse/getty images
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