No more games, no more sports as SEC, others suspend seasons

The SEC has cancelled the basketball tournament in Nashville and just about every pro sports operation has suspended operations.

Yes, that includes Arkansas’ second-round matchup with South Carolina scheduled for Thursday night, baseball through March 30.

That probably includes spring football practice, too, which may not even happen this year with the coronavirus pandemic uncertainty.

As of this writing, the NCAA Indoor Track and Field Championships are still set to be held in Albuquerque.

With the Razorbacks’ 86-73 win over Vanderbilt on Wednesday night (that may go down in the history books as the last league game of this season), Eric Musselman got 20 wins in his first season.

Even the most optimistic basketball folks I knew weren’t predicting that. It was a season where they over-achieved.

“There will be a lot of frustration for our fans,” SEC boss Greg Sankey said in a press conference Thursday afternoon. “This was the appropriate decision.”

Here’s the major points:

• Cancellation of SEC basketball tournament.
• All sports competition suspended through March 30.
• Gymnastics championships are cancelled.

Sankey admitted he didn’t have answers to all the questions right now.

“It may not be March 30,” Sankey said about resuming games. “It may be further.”

With Duke and Kansas announcing Thursday just after noon they will not be playing in the NCAA Tournament if it is held, you can probably assume others will follow their lead and there may not be any March Madness this year.

The biggest question for many fans is the status of spring football, which was scheduled to start Monday for the Hogs in Sam Pittman’s first official practices. Other SEC schools are smack in the middle of workouts.

“I don’t have a prescriptive list of what’s going to happen with spring football,” Sankey said.

All in-person recruiting has been suspended, which will primarily be of interest in football as this is one of the heavier periods for that.

We will update as more information becomes available.