UNLV spring football practices, season face uncertain future

The Mountain West has canceled all team-related activities until at least March 29, effectively ending spring football until then, and the conference is following developments of how the coronavirus outbreak might affect next football season.

“I think everything’s on the table,” conference spokesman Javan Hedlund said Tuesday. “I think right now we’re looking more into the near future.”

The Mountain West on Thursday canceled all spring sports events and championships, but left open the opportunity for teams to have offseason conditioning programs, including spring football practices. UNLV originally planned to begin spring football practices toward the end of this month, but never released a schedule.

Rebels coach Marcus Arroyo, in fact, tweeted last week that recruiting activities and public visits through April 30 would be suspended.

The Mountain West will revisit by Sunday whether to lengthen the moratorium on team activities, and the conference’s athletic directors will be involved in a teleconference at some point this week to further discuss the evolving situation.

San Jose State is not allowed to practice until at least April 7 because of a shelter-in-place order in the San Francisco Bay Area, so it’s likely the Mountain West ban will be extended.

Air Force is the only Mountain West program to have begun and completed spring practices. In addition to UNLV, Hawaii and UNR have not taken the field.

Half of the conference teams, including UNLV, have new coaches, so losing so much spring practice time is a major blow. Whether that times gets made up in some form has not been determined.

The unpredictability of the virus has created questions about the rest of the football calendar as well, such as conference media day in July as well as the beginning of training camp in August and the season itself.

“Everything is being asked,” Hedlund said.

Contact reporter Mark Anderson at manderson@reviewjournal.com. Follow at markanderson65 on Twitter.