Well, it was an interesting early University of Hawaii 2020 football schedule while it lasted.
Which could be until lunchtime today or, maybe, early next week from the look of things.
In the wake of the Big Ten Conference moving to a league games-only schedule, does anyone believe the Pac-12 won’t be one of the next dominoes to fall, jettisoning its nonconference games in the process?
When — not if — it happens that will be another round of sobering news for UH, which has three Pac-12 teams — Arizona, UCLA and Oregon — on its 2020 schedule. Before March and the coming of COVID-19, that looked like a bonus. Now, not so much.
That’s three of the Rainbow Warriors first four games and the outlier of the bunch, Fordham, announced Monday that it has pulled the plug on the Sept. 12 game. UH has been in pursuit of a replacement for that one in case the season gets to start.
Soon it could be in the market for four games, that is if the Mountain West doesn’t throw up its hands soon and follow what is expected to be the march to an all-conference schedule, the last gasp of trying to have a semblance of a fall season at all.
The exit by Fordham of the Football Championship Subdivision costs UH its guaranteed win night. But departures of the Pac-12 opponents would be huge financially.
UH is contracted to receive $400,000 for its Aug. 29 trip to Tucson, Ariz., and $1 million for the Sept. 19 game against the Ducks in Eugene, Ore. That would be COVID-19 restrictions willing, of course, which hardly looks possible in Arizona, the world’s epicenter of the virus these days.
The Sept. 5 UCLA game was to have been the centerpiece of this year’s UH home schedule. The Bruins last played here in 1939 and it has taken 81 years to get them to come back. How long it might be for them to return if this one is scratched is anybody’s guess.
The Big Ten said it was moving to conference-only scheduling for fall sports because, “by limiting competition to other Big Ten institutions, the conference will have the greatest flexibility to adjust its own operations throughout the season and make quick decisions in real-time based on the most current evolving medical advice and the fluid nature of the pandemic.”
The Big Ten and Pac-12, long tied by their shared Rose Bowl tradition, have often been in lock-step on academic and athletic issues and the surprise would be if the Pac-12 doesn’t soon follow the lead of their Midwest brethren.
Pac-12 presidents and chancellors are scheduled to meet today which, even if nothing is immediately announced, could get the ball rolling on a conference-only format. The big question might be whether they try to play nine, 10 or 11 conference games.
Part of the attraction of playing conference-only games (beside retaining league TV money) is that it is supposed to reduce travel for all involved, a major concern in the pandemic period. But if you are UH, the most far-flung outpost in the Mountain West Conference, that doesn’t mean much as you board commercial flights to Colorado Springs, Colo. It is bound to be less attractive to teams coming here from Boise or New Mexico, even if it is on UH’s dime.
But these days you don’t play a season as much as you just try to salvage a piece of one.
2020 UH Football Schedule
Aug. 29 — At Arizona
Sept. 5 — UCLA
Sept. 12 — Open (was Fordham)
Sept. 19 — At Oregon.
Sept. 26 — Open.
Oct. 3 — Nevada
Oct. 10 — New Mexico State
Oct. 17 — At Air Force
Oct. 24 — Boise State
Oct. 31 — At Fresno State
Nov. 7 — New Mexico
Nov. 14 — Nevada-Las Vegas
Nov. 21 — At San Jose State
Nov. 28 — At San Diego State
Reach Ferd Lewis at flewis@staradvertiser.com or 529-4820.
