[Farm93]

This doesn't bode well for Fall season NCAA sports happening this Fall. I can't imagine CSUF is going to be some sort of outlier in the CSU system or that UC won't be acting in a similar fashion.

Hmm.  I could see a rationale where this bodes the other way.

I'm wondering if schools will go online (and collect tuition from some/many), and then take a subset of the student body (athletes), isolate them, and allow them to compete.  The risks described above all go down (though the overall risk of doing this is greater than not doing it, of course).  And the school earns at least some $$ from football, for example.

It would be completely counter-intuitive for this to happen - having no kids at college, except the athletes who are competing on behalf of the school.  But if you consider that football sustains so many college athletic programs across the country, I could see where a broad swath of schools - the football-crazed schools in the south, as well as schools who like to field college teams in many sports - would want to find a way for this to work.  Yes, football $$ would be down due to no/limited gates.  But there still would be TV money, which is real.  There are also the "body bag" games (pun unintended) that are scheduled precisely because those schools need the $$ to sustain the athletic programs.  And the risk of this approach would be lower than that with all students back on all campuses.

Having said all that, I doubt it happens.  But otoh, I wouldn't be shocked if it did.  Stanford, of course, will take the high road and not compete.    But some might argue that that would have happened regardless . . .

The lack of other students would be great for the quarantine aspects of playing without fans.   And, in theory, the student-athletes could easily keep up with classes while living far away from campus.    So if the NCAA was JUST D1 football all would be fine.

However, the NCAA is not just D1 football, so that creates a lot of problems across the full range of divisions and sports. 

That wide range of sports is not the biggest problem though.  Bigger problems are the perception of student-athletes for the NCAA and the impact of an outbreak which would be inevitable.

The perception - Mighty bad look for the NCAA and schools to say it is not safe for students to meet with their professors on campus, but OK for student-athletes to meet with their coaches and practice on campus just to entertain the masses.

The outbreak - It would only be a matter of time for some player(s) to test positive.   What then?   Does that school forfeit and stop if they have one positive test?   Two positive tests?  More?   Would a conference, or the NCAA, test players multiple times a week, while grocery workers, police officers, and health care workers go weeks between tests?  While most citizens never get tested at all?   That's also a very bad look.

CSUF's decision more or less foreshadows an action we will likely see across the state
 
CSUF is a commuter school, but that should make it easier for it to stay open.   If a student tests positive, you just tell them to stay in their off campus apartment or crash with the parents, likely living in the OC, until the virus clears.

Stanford doesn't have that type of easy solution with 95+% living on-campus, one positive result likely means 95% of the students would be at risk of getting COVID19, thanks to community spread, in days.  Students can't stay on campus, and most would be unable to go home if that required air travel.

Given the CDC projection of a larger second wave for the upcoming winter, my only real question is will Stanford go online for the quarter or for the full year?

[Farm93]

This doesn't bode well for Fall season NCAA sports happening this Fall. I can't imagine CSUF is going to be some sort of outlier in the CSU system or that UC won't be acting in a similar fashion.

Hmm.  I could see a rationale where this bodes the other way.

I'm wondering if schools will go online (and collect tuition from some/many), and then take a subset of the student body (athletes), isolate them, and allow them to compete.  The risks described above all go down (though the overall risk of doing this is greater than not doing it, of course).  And the school earns at least some $$ from football, for example.

It would be completely counter-intuitive for this to happen - having no kids at college, except the athletes who are competing on behalf of the school.  But if you consider that football sustains so many college athletic programs across the country, I could see where a broad swath of schools - the football-crazed schools in the south, as well as schools who like to field college teams in many sports - would want to find a way for this to work.  Yes, football $$ would be down due to no/limited gates.  But there still would be TV money, which is real.  There are also the "body bag" games (pun unintended) that are scheduled precisely because those schools need the $$ to sustain the athletic programs.  And the risk of this approach would be lower than that with all students back on all campuses.

Having said all that, I doubt it happens.  But otoh, I wouldn't be shocked if it did.  Stanford, of course, will take the high road and not compete.    But some might argue that that would have happened regardless . . .

The lack of other students would be great for the quarantine aspects of playing without fans.   And, in theory, the student-athletes could easily keep up with classes while living far away from campus.    So if the NCAA was JUST D1 football all would be fine.

However, the NCAA is not just D1 football, so that creates a lot of problems across the full range of divisions and sports. 

That wide range of sports is not the biggest problem though.  Bigger problems are the perception of student-athletes for the NCAA and the impact of an outbreak which would be inevitable.

The perception - Mighty bad look for the NCAA and schools to say it is not safe for students to meet with their professors on campus, but OK for student-athletes to meet with their coaches and practice on campus just to entertain the masses.

The outbreak - It would only be a matter of time for some player(s) to test positive.   What then?   Does that school forfeit and stop if they have one positive test?   Two positive tests?  More?   Would a conference, or the NCAA, test players multiple times a week, while grocery workers, police officers, and health care workers go weeks between tests?  While most citizens never get tested at all?   That's also a very bad look.

CSUF's decision more or less foreshadows an action we will likely see across the state
 
CSUF is a commuter school, but that should make it easier for it to stay open.   If a student tests positive, you just tell them to stay in their off campus apartment or crash with the parents, likely living in the OC, until the virus clears.

Stanford doesn't have that type of easy solution with 95+% living on-campus, one positive result likely means 95% of the students would be at risk of getting COVID19, thanks to community spread, in days.  Students can't stay on campus, and most would be unable to go home if that required air travel.

Given the CDC projection of a larger second wave for the upcoming winter, my only real question is will Stanford go online for the quarter or for the full year?