UPDATE: The Big Ten is set to announce on Wednesday an eight game schedule that will begin on October 24. This is according to multiple reports.
Voting to return was reportedly unanimous after Iowa, Nebraska, and Ohio State were the only schools last month to vote to begin the season.
It looks like Big Ten football will return this fall after all.
After Nebraska president Ted Carter was caught on a hot mic saying that the Conference would make a formal announcement on a fall restart, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel is reporting that an eight-game schedule has been approved with a tentative kickoff date scheduled for October 17.
Sources told the Journal Sentinel on Tuesday that a proposal has been approved for the league to play its 2020 season this fall.
The starting date is unclear, but the latest proposal submitted to the Big Ten’s Council of Presidents and Chancellors featured an Oct. 17 kickoff. Each team is to play eight games in a nine-week window, with the league title game tentatively set for Dec. 19.
This will essentially set up the conference to compete for the four-team playoff which will be announced on December 20.
This new vote comes after Big Ten university presidents had previously voted 11-3 to scrap the fall season last month due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The three schools who voted in favor of starting the season despite the potential real danger of exposing passing players to the deadly virus were Nebraska, Iowa, and Ohio State. Today’s vote also comes despite a previously learning that one-third of Big Ten athletes who tested positive for the coronavirus were discovered to have myocarditis, a rare but potentially serious heart condition which causes the muscle around the heart to become inflamed and possibly inhibit its ability to pump blood.
Colleges around the Country have also become the new hotbed for virus outbreaks.
According to StateCollege.com, 458 additional cases of COVID-19 have been reported by Penn State on Tuesday alone. Nonetheless though, as the ACC, SEC, and other conferences across the United States continue with their seasons, it was hard to imagine the Big Ten missing out on their own potential paydays given the drive of the almighty dollar in college sports.
Lastly, when it comes to fans being able to attend games, that’ll likely be up to individual universities and State restrictions already in place.