Optimism abounds from UK football fans who’ve renewed season tickets amid pandemic
University of Kentucky Director of Athletics Mitch Barnhart, in a message to football season ticket-holders, wrote that the school is planning for football games to be played in the fall.
It was also a reminder that the renewal deadline for season tickets — extended three weeks past its original deadline in April — was Friday, and that the school was willing to work personally with holders if they need to set up a payment plan or just wanted to speak directly about renewal concerns stemming from the COVID-19 pandemic.
“As we have said to many of you in personal conversations, we are committed to making all possible accommodations to assist with payment flexibility for those who may need additional time to renew,” Barnhart wrote.
There are several hurdles that must be cleared before football games, or mass gatherings of any sort on college campuses, can be held in the fall. The most significant one, likely, is the reopening of the campuses to in-person instruction. UK on Friday announced its agenda for plans to re-open on Friday, joining several other Southeastern Conference institutions — including Alabama, Georgia and Tennessee, Kentucky’s nearest neighbor in the league — that have discussed those plans.
SEC Commissioner Greg Sankey in multiple radio interviews this week, comments from which were collected by The Advocate in Baton Rougue, La.., has expressed that the conference also is proceeding as if football and other fall college sports will be played on schedule.
The league could still play in the fall if, say, the Pac-12 Conference decided it would hold off. It’d be harder if Kentucky’s state government deemed sports unsafe while Florida’s OK’d them, though.
“That’s the hard circumstance,” Sankey said. “We want to do this together and we need to do this together. What are the elements that would result in differentials among our 11 states? Could a state have fewer fans, some fans, no fans? Could they not gather their team members at all? “We’re now looking at what type of preparatory time is needed and how do we communicate that nationally.
“The NCAA has a role because we govern practice time and practice dates nationally. Because we missed spring football and altered strength and conditioning, those have to change. Those start to inform the answer about what if one does this and one can do that and one can do that or 10 cannot. Those will be the harder elements.”
The fans
What about the fans, who via ticket purchases contributed a third of the revenue that UK’s football program generated in fiscal year 2019? Without their money, playing college football becomes a much dicier proposition.
Head coach Mark Stoops earlier this week said he didn’t think it was “a viable option” to play football without fans, in part because of the possible criticism that might be invited by it.
“The optics of it, to say that you’re gonna have college players out there that are allowed to play and line up 6 inches apart from each other, breathe on each other, sweat on each other, get in big piles,” Stoops said. “You’re gonna do all that but you’re not allowed to have fans in the stadium?”
Several season ticket-holders responded to a Herald-Leader request for comment on Friday. All renewed their own packages for the 2020 season and, collectively, alluded to dozens of others in their friend groups who have done the same.
Some were told that if football were to be played this fall, but sans fans, then they would be issued refunds for their 2020 purchase. All expressed confidence in UK to do right if circumstances led to such a scenario.
“We are a big football family and tailgate every home game,” wrote Matthew Chandler, a football coach in Danville who attends games with a regular group of about 10 family members and friends. “Honestly, I trust the university and athletic department to handle the refund if it comes to that. I’d rather them keep being positive and hopeful considering it’s months away.”
Andrew McKenzie, of Paris, renewed but said he’d rather rely on precedents set by other sports leagues and large gatherings than for college football to be a trailblazer.
“If the other sports have resumed and there appears to be no spikes in cases or concerns, I will not worry about it too much,” said McKenzie, who noted that, if football were to be moved to the winter season, it would not deter him from attending.
Chris Hawkins and Jordan Mathus did not have season tickets until last season but both renewed.
“(I) lucked into some good seats that I didn’t want to lose,” wrote Mathus, who was told the refund process, if necessary, would be like the one offered to spring sports season ticket-holders in March.
Randy Worley, of Corbin, is part of a 16-person group that has packed into Kroger Field for the last 10 years. Worley, a season ticket-holder himself for about 20 years, said his group waited until this week to renew just to see how much information might be available to them before making the decision.
He’s 50, and said some members of their group are approaching their 60s. Worley would like to see Kentucky make some accommodations for older season ticket-holders and those with potentially compromising health conditions who might face the choice of possibly losing seats that they’ve had for decades. He suggested that they could make a K Fund donation but not be required to pay for their seats, which could then still be sold to other fans in 2020.
Worley’s on board with a winter season, too, if needed. If the decision comes down between having college football with fans or not playing it at all during the 2020-21, Worley says play ball.
“I’ll sit at home and watch Kentucky football for a year,” he said.
