Oklahoma football: Players to return July 1; decision on fans still a ways off

Oklahoma football players are still a little over two weeks away from returning to Norman for voluntary workouts, while other schools are into  their second week of football activities.

OU has elected to delay the return of its players for voluntary football activities until July 1, which is several weeks later than most of the major college programs. Head coach Lincoln Riley doesn’t look at the later start date as a competitive disadvantage. Quite the reverse, actually.

Both Riley and athletic director Joe Castiglione consider the extra couple of weeks to be an advantage in learning more about the coronavirus and what other schools are experiencing in addressing the ongoing risks and concerns.

Like every school before it, Oklahoma plans to test every player upon their return to campus. Castiglione told the Voice of the Sooners, Toby Rowland, on his morning program on SportsTalk1400 Radio last week that the cost of testing every player will be between $75 and $100 and testing the entire team will be around $15,000 to $18,000. The antibody test will run a little less than that, he said.

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The OU AD also said that as more tests become available, the price will likely come down. The Sooners plan to use the nasopharyngeal test, which is currently believed to be the most reliable and accurate test on the market. But the university will keep an open mind and continue to look at other methods of testing as the technology evolves.

Riley has said all along that as long as the Sooners had 10 to 15 practices prior to the start of the season they could be ready to play. Last week the NCAA Division I Football Oversight Committee put forth a plan calling for a six-week practice schedule. That plan still requires approval from the NCAA Division I Council, which is scheduled to take it up on Wednesday.

Using Oklahoma as an example, under the proposed preseason practice schedule the Sooners could start required football workouts on July 15, walkthrough sessons on July 24 and preseason training camp could get underway on Aug. 7.

What we have seen from several of the Power Five schools that began voluntary workouts over the last seven to 10 days is some players testing positive for the coronavirus. That hasn’t created near the alarm that it would have, say, two months ago. The teams seem to be dealing with it, following health and safety protocols that were put in place prior to the return of the student-athletes to their respective campus sites.

This is part of the learning curve that Oklahoma was wanting to gain from by delaying the return of its players a couple of weeks longer than everybody else.

“We’ve learned so much more about it” just in the two weeks since we announced the later starting date for voluntary workouts, Riley said last week in a Zoom call with reporters. “Some of the testing and quarantine procedures for our players (and support staff) have changed just in that time.”

There are still plenty of questions to be addressed and managed by the time the regular season is scheduled to begin. The one issue that appears to be firmly in the rear-view mirror at this stage is the strong commitment everyone associated with the college game has toward playing football in the fall.

A limited number of Oklahoma season tickets will go on sale on Wednesday, even though, Castiglione acknowledges, plans have not been formalized on how many fans will be allowed to attend home games and how that will be organized in terms of seating configuration.

Sooner officials say those decisions are still a ways down the road while the immediate focus is on the health and safety of the players when they return to campus to return to football activities.