As the coronavirus pandemic begins hitting the United State the Southeastern Conference is taking extreme measures to ensure the safety of their student-athletes, coaches, and staff.
All SEC on-campus events have been suspended until March 30 at the earliest. This includes the SEC basketball tournament in Nashville as well as softball, baseball, gymnastics and all of the spring sports.
“We understand that this decision will be disappointing to our student-athletes and coaches who have been preparing all season to compete in this event as well as viewers at home,” said SEC Commissioner Greg Sankey. “While this was not an easy decision, the health and well-being of our entire SEC community is of paramount importance.”
The regular season basketball champion, Kentucky, will be awarded the SEC’s slot in the NCAA tournament.
As for baseball, it’s unclear how the games would be made up. Florida will have 12 baseball games canceled. Florida was set to open SEC play this weekend hosting the University of Georgia and will have three conference series suspended (Kentucky and Texas A&M).
Softball will have 11 games suspended, including conference games against Ole Miss and Kentucky.
The Gators Ticket Office will automatically refund all ticket purchases for events scheduled to take place from March 13 to March 30. Refunds will be processed back to the form of payment used for the original purchase. All purchasers will be contacted once the refund is processed.
Florida football was set to begin spring practice on Monday, March 16. There has been no official word if spring practice will go off as planned but it doesn’t fall under the SEC’s ruling today given that it isn’t an intercollegiate competition. Florida would be permitted to hold practices, in all spring sports, including football. Florida’s UAA already announced that the six practices that were set to be open to the public will be closed.
Gator Country will have more as this story continues to develop.