The Big South Conference has postponed their conference football competition to Spring of 2021, the league announced on Wednesday.
The decision, which was made a result of the ongoing novel coronavirus 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic. includes Big South football, men’s and women’s cross country, men’s and women’s soccer, and volleyball.
“We are all broken-hearted that we will not be able to provide competitive opportunities for Big South student-athletes this fall,” said Big South Commissioner Kyle Kallander. “However, the path forward must protect the health and safety of our student-athletes, and some of the current trends and unknowns with COVID-19 have made that a huge challenge. Our intention is to shift these fall seasons to the spring as we would like nothing more than to crown Big South champions in all 19 of our sports this year.”
Similar to the Missouri Valley Football Conference, the Big South will allow its football members to play non-conference games this fall at their own discretion.
The Big South Football Members voted to allow up to four non-conference games in the fall at institutional discretion.
The Big South Conference is the tenth Football Championship Subdivision (FCS) conference to cancel their fall sports, joining the Ivy League, Patriot League, Mid-Eastern Athletic Association (MEAC), Southwestern Athletic Conference (SWAC), Colonial Athletic Association (CAA), Northeast Conference (NEC), Pioneer Football League (PFL), Big Sky Conference, and Missouri Valley Football Conference (MVFC). Most of these conferences will attempt to play in the Spring of 2021, but exact plans haven’t been announced.
The three remaining FCS conferences that are, for now, forging ahead with their 2020 season are the Ohio Valley Conference (OVC), Southern Conference (SoCon), and Southland Conference.