Today, Purdue will send word to its student-athletes urging them to not return to campus from spring break unless absolutely necessary, and effective immediately, its facilities are closed through April 6.
As the spread of COVID-19 has brought unprecedented challenges to his athletic department — and everyone, everywhere, for that matter — Mike Bobinski's priority is to close ranks around Purdue's student-athlete base and the well-being of department personnel.
"It's got to be health and safety first," Bobinski said of his guiding principle through all that's going on. "Anything we do has to be in the interest of not contributing to or accelerating the spread of the virus and doing our very best to help to get to the other side of the mountain here and get to whatever normal will look like when we're through this thing as quickly as possible. We're trying to make decisions and operate in a way that supports that objective as opposed to fights against it."
What that normal looks like whenever that day comes is something of an abstract concept at this point as athletic operations at Purdue — and obviously Purdue is not alone in this, nor is anyone or any thing alone in this — have ground to a halt.
Today was supposed to be the tip-off of the NCAA Tournament, college sports' greatest stage. There's no NCAA Tournament, nor will there be spring athletic seasons, anywhere.
The NBA season is on hold, its suspension last Wednesday night serving as the seminal moment of the shutdown coronavirus has brought to the sports world. In his small corner of that world, as the athletic director of one the NCAA's hundreds of college programs, Bobinski says this new reality came quick.
"I'll be honest with you. I didn't anticipate it," he said. "Maybe that's just ignorance on my part or the lack of scientific and medical expertise. I didn't anticipate that it would accelerate to this point this quickly, that we would see this dramatic impact on not just athletics. We're one little piece of the puzzle here. We're all operating in a different environment right now where you can't do the things that you're used to doing and they're just not available. And that's something that I think caught all of us a little bit unaware.
"If you think back just one week ago, we were in shoot-around this time, getting ready to play a game Thursday night. A week later, it seems like it's been six months since then. This has been the longest week that I can recall in maybe forever, because of the shifting sands and the changing dynamic around us, literally multiple times a day. It has been very unusual and challenging for everybody. I get that not just us, but we're all just trying to figure it out on the fly."
There's going to be much to figure out, the financial fallout being a front-burner issue. USA Today reported this week that the NCAA's insurance policy covering lost Tournament revenue is expected to fall well short of projected earnings, important money for its membership. Bobinski said he doesn't know yet just how blunt that hit will be, but does know that it will represent a significant loss. Expenses saved from there being no spring athletic seasons, no off-campus or on-campus recruiting, etc., will save Purdue a little more than $1 million, Bobinski estimated. A drop in the bucket relative to the earnings due to be lost.
Regarding one of Purdue's boldest on-going endeavors, the Ross-Ade Stadium project obviously isn't the most pressing concern at the moment. But there's almost no way around the project not being affected.
The first piece of that puzzle, the installation of the new video board and the South end zone renovation that comes with it, will go on as planned. That part of the project is paid for, on schedule and will go on as long as crews are permitted to work on it, Bobinski said.
As for the remainder of the project, which is going to require significant private financing of well more than $100 million, now with a potential recession on the horizon, it's just like so much else: On indefinite hold.
"Everything else (beside the video board) at this moment in time that we've anticipated is currently put in sort of a hiatus status," Bobinski said. "We put the planning for the further Ross-Ade project on hold right now because we can't even gather to talk about it."
Much more from Bobinski to come.
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