Kansas Jayhawks’ Bill Self addresses COVID cancellations across college basketball
COVID-19 has forced the cancellation of some marquee men’s college basketball games this week, including Ohio State vs. Kentucky and UCLA vs. North Carolina.
With the pandemic apparently far from over — the NBA has been hit with numerous positive cases the past couple of weeks — Bill Self was asked Friday if he was “worried for college basketball this season.”
“I would say no,” Self, Kansas’ 19th-year men’s basketball coach, said after pausing to reflect a bit on the question. “I would say as a sport, no, but individually you definitely could be impacted in certain ways, certain times. Last year was week-to-week on our sport. This year I think it may be week-to-week on a team.
“I don’t think anything is going to happen in my opinion, I hope not, to take away from us continuing to play and not have pauses.”
Self was speaking after practice Friday, one held in advance of Saturday’s nonconference game against Stephen F. Austin of the Western Athletic Conference. Tipoff is 7 p.m. at Allen Fieldhouse.
“I guess you could, yes,” Self said, asked if he feels he could at any minute get a phone call from a future opponent saying the game is off because of COVID issues in a program. “It happened obviously with Ohio State and UCLA. Duke had to get another game (after Cleveland State canceled this week).”
Self’s team for the most part avoided COVID issues a year ago until the worst possible time, the postseason, when David McCormack, Tristan Enaruna and Jalen Wilson tested positive.
“If we’re going to get it, we’re going to get it. You just hope it doesn’t knock you out much,” Self said. “Hopefully it won’t knock us out much because hopefully the symptoms will be asymptomatic or very few at all.
“It’s real,” Self stated, referring to COVID affecting sports again this season. “I don’t see how right now the NCAA could take the path the NBA is doing (possibly testing players daily during the holiday season) just from a financial standpoint. It’s so expensive to test everyone every day, Tier One people or whatever.
“We’ll probably have to deal with it at some point in time this year. I hope not, but fortunately I’m just glad we are vaccinated and boostered up. Hopefully that will be enough to get us through.”
Self has said in the past all KU players and coaches have been fully vaccinated. Asked if everybody had received a booster shot, Self said Friday: “If not everybody we are down to a couple. We are in pretty good shape there.”
Self explained that there’s currently “no testing protocol. There’s symptoms. Symptoms create a mandate to test now. If you don’t have symptoms you are not tested. As soon as you get symptoms you are tested for everything. That’s how it works.”
Self said the Jayhawks “will take whatever precautions our medical people say we should take. Maybe we wear masks more. Last year everything was such an unknown. Nobody was vaccinated last year. At least with the vaccination stats, they play out even if you do develop symptoms they might not be as serious as without the vaccination. I don’t know if that’s 100%. I think that’s certainly the percentage play. We’ve done everything we could.
“This year we’ve taken all the medical steps there is for us to go through life and not be impacted on the same level we were last year. I am confident even though it could get complicated it won’t get to the point like it did (disrupting the sport) last year.”
Self said advice he’ll try to follow is “to deal with it, roll with it. Don’t try to manage the unmanageable. Don’t get too frustrated whenever things happen. “
Stephen F. Austin will take an 8-3 record into the game Saturday. KU enters with an 8-1 record.
This story was originally published December 17, 2021 at 2:52 PM.
