With Saturday’s rivalry game against Michigan canceled, Ohio State coach Ryan Day on Tuesday said the Big Ten should revisit its rule requiring teams to play at least six games this season to be eligible for the conference championship game.
Because No. 4 Ohio State (5-0) can’t play Michigan because of COVID-19 issues within the Wolverines program, the Buckeyes won’t qualify under the current rule and Indiana would represent the East division against Northwestern at noon ET on Dec. 19.
Sources have told ESPN that Big Ten athletic directors could consider changing the rule at their meeting on Wednesday.
“I think it’s one of those things that was put into place early on, and decisions are made based on the information you have at the time, and things change, as we know,” Day said less than an hour before Michigan officially canceled the game. “… I just think we have to take a hard look periodically at all of this stuff, and this is one of those situations. If we don’t quite get the game we need to get in the championship game, I think that needs to be looked at hard, just like anybody else in the conference.
“There’s no easy solution in times like this. I know those guys are going to come together and take a hard look at it and make sure it was the right decision.”
Big Ten commissioner Kevin Warren said the conference will “remain fluid” in addressing the issue.
“We’ll continue to remain transparent,” Warren said Tuesday. “We’ll continually communicate internally with our coaches and athletic directors as we continue to make decisions that will impact our conference over the next two weeks. We’ll work through these issues. … This has never happened before.”
Ohio State had its Nov. 14 game at Maryland canceled because of COVID-19 within the Terps program, and it canceled its Nov. 28 game at Illinois because of a coronavirus outbreak within its own program. While the College Football Playoff does not have a minimum number of games that teams need to play to qualify for semifinals, conference titles are one tiebreaker that the selection committee uses to help evaluate comparable teams.
“In our evaluation, there’s head-to-head, there’s common opponents, there’s strength of schedule,” CFP selection committee chair Gary Barta said last week. “If a team does or doesn’t play in a conference championship, that certainly is one less criteria we can evaluate. It’s not the only one, but one less we have available to us.”
If the Big Ten doesn’t change its eligibility rule, Ohio State can still finish 6-0 without a title because all conference teams are still expected to play one more game against each other in Champions Week (Dec. 18-19), as long as they are healthy.
The Big Ten presidents and chancellors also approved a rule in November that if two conference teams have opponents cancel games during the same week because of the coronavirus, they can play each other.
If Purdue, which canceled practice Tuesday to evaluate its latest COVID-19 testing, had to cancel against Indiana, the Big Ten could move around games or have Indiana and Ohio State play again.
Day, who announced on Nov. 27 he tested positive for COVID-19, returned to his office on Monday for the first time after spending 10 days in isolation, per guidelines from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. He is expected to coach the team at practice on Tuesday.
As players and coaches met with the media on Tuesday, they all said they were practicing and preparing for the Wolverines.
Ohio State defensive coordinator Kerry Coombs, who spoke to reporters before the game was canceled, said the thought of not playing Saturday’s game makes him sick to his stomach.
“This game’s been part of my life since I was 5 years old,” Coombs said. “This game means a lot. We want to play.”
