San Jose State AD says football with few fans likely
San Jose State athletic director Marie Tuite said in a radio interview Tuesday that she was hopeful that “we’re going to have fall sports. There may not be many spectators, but we’re planning with our campus being open that we would have fall competition.”
Tuite made her comments on San Francisco radio station KNBR, giving further voice that college football and other sports might be played without or with a limited number of spectators because of the coronavirus outbreak.
UNLV has made no such announcement about fall competition. Any such decision would be made by the Mountain West, to which both UNLV and San Jose State belong.
Tuite is the first athletic administrator in the Mountain West to publicly push such a plan. She said the Mountain West’s TV deal, which will pay each school more than $3 million beginning this year, will help make up some of the difference.
“Certainly, ticket sales and your game-day revenue is important,” Tuite said. “We’re not drawing 20,000 fans. So even though that’s a little bit of a hurt for us in attendance, it’s really the television package where we can generate additional revenue to help everyone.”
Contact reporter Mark Anderson at manderson@reviewjournal.com. Follow @markanderson65 on Twitter.
