Cowboy Football About to Start Testing and Protocols as Players Prepare to Return
STILLWATER -- We all know that the Big 12 Board of Governors (member university presidents and chancellors) voted last Friday and a three-stage re-entry of student-athletes to Big 12 campuses starting with football student-athletes set to begin workouts on June 15. Volleyball, soccer, and cross country student-athletes will be allowed to get back and begin workouts on July 1 and all other student-athletes will be permitted back to campus to begin training on July 15.
A source informed Pokes Report on the plan for football at Oklahoma State and it begins this Thursday as the staff will be back and hold a staff meeting in the facility. Already, the football staff has been briefed by sports medicine personnel including team physician Dr. Val Gene Iven, head of athletic training John Stemm, and the head football trainer Scott Parker on the protocols that will be in place for when the players return.
The weight room will be a heavy emphasis as much of the work will be done in there, but locker rooms, showers, meeting rooms, really every inch of the facility will be regularly and thoroughly cleaned and disinfected.
The football staff will undergo their first testing on Friday as staff from OSU Medicine in Tulsa will be there to conduct the testing. The staff will be tested likely twice a week for the summer.
The first athletes will come in June 1 and these will be players that need rehab and supervision in order to be prepared to begin workouts. Wide receiver Tylan Wallace is coming off his ACL injury and surgery, but quarterback Spencer Sanders is still working to get past his hand surgery. He was cleared for spring practice, but after being gone for so long the medical staff will want to see him. The same goes for running back Chuba Hubbard.
Other football student-athletes will report on June 4 and more on June 8 in order to be tested and prepared to begin regular workouts with the strength and conditioning staff on June 15.
There will be one entry into the facility and one only where temperatures will be taken and armbands will be issued that show the individual to be healthy and cleared to be in the building.
Workouts and meetings will be held and a precise schedule of what kind of interaction and work involving the staff and players can be done and when it is allowed to happen.
COVID-19 is causing for strict security and a change in the way things are done with the football staff and their athletes.
