Barbour discusses spring practice, chances of Blue-White Game
Nothing can be taken for granted as the pandemic continues to play havoc with both winter sports and the fall sports that have belatedly started up. But athletic director Sandy Barbour said Tuesday that Penn State has every intention of holding a conventional spring football practice – or at least as close to conventional as is possible in 2021.
“I don’t know whether you want to call it ‘official’ or not, but just like with all of our sports, we’re going to continue to train, and if it’s appropriate in a particular sport, compete,” Barbour said. “We’re going to continue to do that unless the conditions change and it’s not safe or healthy for us to do it. So yeah, we’re a go."
Barbour said that the Big Ten could conceivably impose restrictions on spring practice that would go beyond anything the NCAA might put in place. But, she added, “I don’t see that happening.”
Not a Subscriber? Join us With Our FREE 30-Day Premium Trial
“We’re having on-field practices for 30 of our programs right now, and then football would be the 31st,” she said. “From an NCAA structure, they’re allowed to have on-field practices. Obviously, they’re going through training and winter conditioning right now, and unless conditions were to change for the worse, I don’t see anything other than us going through a traditional spring practice.”
Even if the team is able to hold a relatively normal set of spring drills, the Blue-White Game will almost certainly will look very different than it typically does. Most years, Penn State welcomes crowds of 60,000 or 70,000 to Beaver Stadium as part of the university’s unofficial spring reunion weekend. But last year’s game was canceled, and the status of the 2021 edition is uncertain. Barbour couldn’t say for sure whether the game would be played, and even if it is played, the attendance restrictions could look much as they did during the 2020 season.
“I think it’s too early to tell right now in terms of what the conditions are going to be. If it were to be today, we would be limited to about 2,500 in Beaver Stadium,” Barbour said. “It would be limited to families of players and staff. We’re going to have to get a lot closer to what the time frame would be before we can really decide if we’re going to have a Blue-White Game and what that might look like.”
Looking beyond the spring, Barbour said Penn State is planning for a number of contingencies regarding home attendance. The rollout of COVID vaccines has given rise to hopes that the 2021 season will not be played in mostly empty stadiums as it was this past fall. But while there are now some weapons with which to fight back against the virus, there’s no way to know at this point how much optimism is warranted.
“We’re planning, obviously, on a 2021 season where we’ll have fans,” Barbour said. “We can scale that to everything from 107,000 on down. As we get closer to that, we’ll have to take a look at, if there are restrictions, what they are, and what the financial ramifications will be. We’re looking more at what would be the operational things? What role will the vaccine play? Will people need to show us a certification that they’ve been vaccinated? Will you be asked to wear masks? It’s things like that – how we operationalize and how our fans see coming to Penn State football. I’ll tell you this: Based on the rollover and new [season ticket] sales, we’re over 90 percent renewed. The passion for Penn State football, and now the pent-up demand, is huge. Will there be people who won’t come because of their concerns? Probably. There will be some. But we have to operationalize it, and then we have to project what we’re looking at from a revenue standpoint.”
*******
• Talk about this article inside The Lions Den
• Watch our videos and subscribe to our YouTube channel
• Learn more about our print and digital publication, Blue-White Illustrated
• Follow us on Twitter: @BWIonRivals, @NateBauerBWI, @RivalsSnyder, @DavidEckert98
• Like us on Facebook