NCAA Weighing Extra Year of Eligibility For Winter Sports Athletes

Photo Courtesy: Peter H. Bick

Winter Sports Athletes Could Receive Extra Year of Eligibility

The NCAA Council will decide at a later meeting if winter sports athletes this season will receive another year of eligibility over concerns that the season will be deeply affected by the COVID-19 pandemic, sources have confirmed to Swimming World.

The COVID-19 pandemic first affected winter sports like swimming last year when the NCAA had to cancel the entirety of the winter sports championships, including the famed March Madness basketball tournament as well as the Division II swimming & diving championships halfway through the meet. The spring sports season was wiped out entirely, and the affected student athletes were granted another year of eligibility over getting their season taken away out of their control.

Fall sports in the NCAA have slowly come back, with three of the five Division I power conferences returning to football with the Big Ten set to join next week. The NCAA has already taken no chances on fall sports, allowing student athletes an extra year of eligibility if they did not or could not play this year because of the ongoing pandemic. But that decision did not affect swimmers or divers, since they fall under winter sports.

No swim teams have held meets yet with more than one team, as the SEC will return to competition at the end of the month with no championships at the end of the year just yet. The Big Ten will start competing in January, and the Pac-12 will follow suit.

The NCAA has not made any changes or adjustments yet as to what a national championship meet would look like, but the men’s meet is expected to be moved from Iowa City to Greensboro.

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Sherry Catron

3 years ago

Who’s going to pay the extra year of tuition to compete?