Ohio State's Ryan Day Keeps Speculation in Quarantine

Evolving details on COVID-19 make guessing about the future foolhardy

Ryan Days is curious, like you, about the viability of starting the college football season on time, or starting it at all.

But Day, unlike you, seems to know that his words will reverberate the minute he offers a concrete opinion on what decision-makers should do.

And so while it's not officially a habit he's taken up while being compelled to shelter in place during COVID-10 precautions, tap-dancing is Day's order of the day when it comes to taking a public position on his belief about how or when college football should hit the re-set button.

"I think there's been more conversation about what some options are," Day said Wednesday. "We're doing that on a weekly basis and trying to give our input. Certainly, it's going to come down to the different task forces and the committees that have come together and the medical authorities on where we start with this. That's really where it begins.

"From there, as football coaches, we're going to have to give our input and try to figure it all out. The first concern is public health and the student-athlete's welfare and well-being. We have to start with that.

"Once we kind of get those guidelines on return to play, return to work, we can kind of start building that."

That's a long, eloquent way of saying, I don't know, which is really all Day or anyone else can safely say right now.

Safely, because to say anything too optimistic or pessimistic is certain to anger a certain faction. 

Oklahoma State coach Mike Gundy stepped forward with a plan last week to get players back on campus in May, test them, clear them and then sequester them while they ramp up for the season.

Gundy got hammered for his callousness to dare making such a suggestion, without his ideas getting much airing.

Dr. Anthony Fauci, director the National Institute for Allergy and Infectious Diseases, addressed many of the same ideas Wednesday that Gundy floated.

Ohio State athletic director Gene Smith didn't sound thrilled with the idea of playing college football without fans when he spoke last week.

Smith is concerned how that would look, putting players into an environment deemed unsafe for spectators.

Mississippi coach Lane Kiffin, never a wallflower when it comes to giving his opinion, told Knoxville radio station WNML on Monday that considering football without fans is "a waste of time."

 If it’s not safe for people to be around people, you’re not going to play football,” Kiffin said. “You can’t have 120 kids on one sideline around each other. Probably 250 people when it comes to all the staff and student managers. It’s not going to happen. You can’t have that many people around each other."

Day said Wednesday that he has "ideas" on a re-start to the season, but when asked to enumerate, he declined, citing a Big Ten request for coaches to stay silent on specifics.

Consider that conference edict at the root of this very detailed, very general response from the OSU coach on what he'd recommend.

"We have to look at all different options," Day said. "There are a lot of smart people in the world. There are a lot of smart people in college football and the NCAA. I think we'll come up with a great solution if we put our minds to it.

"But there are just still so many unknowns, it's hard to move anything. I do think we can create some models of different plans, based on return to play. But I still think it's too early on that. The best thing to do is keep talking this thing through and keep everything as up to date as possible.

"Once some decisions are made and we get a better feel for where this is going, then we can make some quick decisions."

Comment on this story below. Do you think OSU will start the season on time? Will the season still feature 12 regular season games? 

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