While a pair of major college football conferences have already announced plans to shrink their football footprint this fall, another group has decided to push back the entire schedule.
According to Max Olson of TheAthletic.com, the National Junior College Athletic Association president and CEO Dr. Christopher Parker said teams would move to a spring season, playing up to eight games with practices beginning in early March.
“We would like to play football this fall,” Parker said. “But I think from a national perspective, moving it is probably the right decision holistically.”
The NJCAA board of regents will meet Monday to vote, but Parker said the eight-game spring football schedule is “the direction it would be heading in.”
The NJCAA has 512 member schools in 45 states, and 54 of those schools sponsor football programs. The CCCAA, a California community college league with 66 football programs, announced last week all sports were moving to the spring.
While that might complicate recruiting for major programs, it’s also another sign of the growing unease about playing football on any scale in the fall.
The Big 10 and Pac 12 have already announced conference-only schedules, and others could follow suit in the coming days.