Big 10 conference makes decision to play football

Big Ten football is back.
After the decision not to play football this fall was made back on August 11, conference presidents and chancellors voted to bring football back during a Wednesday vote.
According to reports, the Big Ten will begin a conference only season beginning on October 24. Each team will play eight games within the conference, six divisional games and two cross-over games, with the championship set for December 19.
What changed the various administrators minds?
According to the conference more information about the virus and the opportunity to have more rapid testing tilted the decision to resume play. However, there are some that believe that pressure from parents of players, and political pressure from government officials had a hand in swaying the leaders of the universities.
“It wasn’t about political pressure, it wasn’t about money, it wasn’t about lawsuits and it wasn’t about what everyone else is doing,” Morton Schapiro, the president of Northwestern and the chairman of the Big Ten’s Council of Presidents and Chancellors. ““The feeling was that if we can play football safely, and there was a way, and the Big Ten was going to provide the costs of daily testing and we were able to do it, I don’t see any reason why you don’t want to go forward.”
The prevailing sentiment, at least from most of the players is that football is back.
“Our players want to play, our coaches want to coach and our fans want to watch,” said Bill Moos, the athletic director at Nebraska. “And we’re going to be able to do all of these things now, and that’s why it is a celebration. And I believe, and very strongly, that the state of Nebraska needs football.”
There are still those players that had decided to opt out of the season way before any decision on whether there would be a season or not came to fruition.
Like the SEC, those players will be allowed to opt back in, unless they have already declared for the draft and have hired an agent. If that is the case, then they are considered automatically ineligible.
However, those athletes can take a chance on being re-instated by going through the Student-Athlete Reinstatement process.
Each case would be taken individually and given a thorough examination. Several key players from the Big Ten the decided on the opt out included Penn State linebacker Micah Parsons, Minnesota wide receiver Rashod Bateman and Ohio State cornerback Shaun Wade. All three are considered top 15 picks in the 2021 draft.
The big question now becomes, can Big Ten teams still be able to participate in the College Football Playoff with such a late start?
As far as the time line goes, with the championship game to take place at the date it is scheduled, the Big Ten could send representatives to the CFP. However, the final call on if the Big Ten actually does have teams in the final four of the college football season ultimately rests in the hands of the playoff management committee, who must give the green light.
So, in essence, all remaining 10 FBS commissioners and Notre Dame’s athletic director will be the final work on if Big Ten teams get a shot at a National Championship. How will league commissioners, like Greg Sankey of the SEC, vote? That is yet to be seen.
The truth is, the SEC and the Big 12 will probably not be too anxious to allow the Big Ten into the door of the CFP, considering that teams in that conference will have played two less games.
The flip side to all of this is that there maybe some teams in the other conferences, like the SEC and ACC, that cannot complete their own season because of a COVID-19 outbreak. There have already been games that have been cancelled this season already.
“We will follow whatever protocol is determined by the management committee,” CFP Executive Director Bill Hancock said. “Scheduling is a decision made by the conferences and we respect and welcome whatever actions the conferences take.”