NCAA WILL be allowing some fans at March Madness ...
Up to 25% capacity at the various sites (Indy, Bloomington, West Lafayette, etc).
Ticket allocation decisions TBD ..... but perhaps some U-M fans will have an opportunity to see the most important games of the basketball season.
https://sports.yahoo.com/march-madness-fans-ncaa-tournament-2021-161736289.html
February 19th, 2021 at 1:01 PM ^
Well this is interesting... Deciding to let people in when the pandemic has reached levels far exceeding where it was when they decided not to let people in. Whatever. They won't even try to explain the hypocritical thinking that goes with 'going with the flow' in the name of money.
February 19th, 2021 at 2:07 PM ^
Sports have been going on for months with limited fan attendance and no outbreaks have been reported, that I know of. I'll be curious to see how they handle this, but I don't see an issue if they have protocols in place to keep the players/coaches/event staff in a bubble like the NBA did.
February 19th, 2021 at 2:38 PM ^
Agree. The difference here is that there are examples and data points to compare to. I am definitely not up on the literature to know if this is a dumb decision or a sensible decision, but to just blindly say it's bad because we canceled in March is a pretty limited way of thinking about it.
Any fans in the building would not be considered close contacts to any of the players in the way that I understand close contact to currently be defined.
As someone who is lucky enough to be vaccinated, I would almost certainly be willing and excited to attend with a good mask if I was lucky enough to get a ticket.
February 19th, 2021 at 2:52 PM ^
It makes no sense. Like a coach wearing a mask watching his team run up and down the floor all with no masks on. And during a timeout when his players gather around him he takes the mask off to talk to them face to face.
February 19th, 2021 at 2:55 PM ^
Explaining things might lead to the expectation of standards and consistency, so we have to avoid that.
February 19th, 2021 at 3:02 PM ^
This is the kind of stuff that happens when people aren’t afraid enough. Well we can fix that!
February 19th, 2021 at 1:01 PM ^
then what's the point of the Indy bubble?
February 19th, 2021 at 1:06 PM ^
As another poster just mentioned. What is the point of the bubble?
If the plan is to send every tournament team to the same city, and they are allowing fans in certain venues in that city, that just increases the risk of a shutdown again if an outbreak happens.
Dumb.
February 19th, 2021 at 1:07 PM ^
I'm mostly interested to see how many upsets there are this year. I've always believed the neutral crowd rooting for the underdog plays a large part in the shockers.
February 19th, 2021 at 1:23 PM ^
Outstanding news. I will see if I can enjoy some live games with Indy Matt and siblings if they are interested.
February 19th, 2021 at 1:34 PM ^
Same, since I live here.
February 19th, 2021 at 2:41 PM ^
Same, since I live here.
Plus, bonus: Fully vaccinated.
February 19th, 2021 at 2:55 PM ^
Chuck in Indy. Count me in!
February 19th, 2021 at 1:51 PM ^
Awesome news. I’ve been discussing meeting a buddy in Indy if we could get tickets.
We both got our shots. Flights are cheap. Why the hell not?
February 19th, 2021 at 2:01 PM ^
As Kevin Malone would say, my question is... it seems dumb.
February 19th, 2021 at 2:09 PM ^
Yeah, that makes no sense. They're creating a bubble, and placing it in the middle of bunch of pointy objects...
February 19th, 2021 at 3:30 PM ^
It's madness!
What a way to run a bidness.
February 19th, 2021 at 4:24 PM ^
march partial madness
February 19th, 2021 at 4:35 PM ^
Why is the Mgoblog community so scared of COVID- I get it if you are over 70 & have health issues but for someone under 70 without other illnees the risk is very small and probably even smaller than we currently believe because treatment has improved.
February 19th, 2021 at 4:43 PM ^
And here we still are.
February 19th, 2021 at 5:53 PM ^
Some of us know people who have died or had their lives changed in drastic ways from it. One of my friends can't do their job anymore because they had brain damage from it. Another friend knows someone who was a doctor and now they don't have muscle control over their hand. I'm glad to have been vaccinated and never gotten it.
February 19th, 2021 at 5:15 PM ^
I'm interested in how this plays out. I had FF tickets for last year and they let last year's ticket holders bypass the lottery so I have them for this year.
February 19th, 2021 at 6:34 PM ^
I’ll be there
February 20th, 2021 at 7:27 AM ^
It may be a bigger issue of, should they allow a higher percentage of fans to the games. At this point NCAA could just require proof of antibodies for COVID or vaccination. Antibody test easy to get if a person donates blood. Yesterday a Dr from John’s Hopkins estimated that 50% of Americans have antibodies now due to studies showing large numbers of people having a history of unknown asymptomatic COVID besides the ones that were known. 15% vaccinated at this point and rising weekly are added to the people with antibodies from previous infection as well as T cell immunity. He determined that there should gradually develop herd immunity in the next 2 months, with case numbers declining as we approach that time.
February 22nd, 2021 at 8:14 PM ^
Not to worry. Biden will have the pandemic cleared up by tourney time.