Liberty Athletic Director Ian McCaw met with the media on Thursday to discuss the Flames’ game at Coastal Carolina this Saturday being canceled as well as a wide array of questions surrounding the 2020 season, LU’s bowl aspirations, scheduling and more. Here’s everything he had to say beginning with his opening statement:
“I’m certainly disappointed for our coaches, student-athletes, Flames Nation, who were all looking forward to this game, but at the same time I support the decision of our medical team who are charged with providing care for our student-athletes. That’s first and foremost, again, I support their decision to pause the activity based on the results that we’ve received.”
WHEN STUFF POPPED UP SUNDAY, DID YOU GET IN CONTACT WITH COASTAL AT THAT TIME? HOW DID THINGS WITH BYU SEEM TO ACCELERATE AS THE WEEK PROGRESSED?
“We were in communication with Coastal Carolina and College GameDay throughout the week, and we were just transparent about our situation. We let them know early in the week that we had some concerns, and gave them daily updates. We all knew that the tests from yesterday were going to be really key. We tested our whole team on Sunday, got those results back on Monday, and then we knew yesterday’s test was going to be significant, and based on those results we knew we couldn’t move forward.”
“I didn’t have any communication with BYU, although I did call their athletic director this morning and wished them well in the game.”
IT’S HARD TO QUANTIFY WHAT YOU LOSE IN EXPOSURE, HOW DO YOU MINIMIZE THE LOSS THAT YOU HAVE FROM THIS?
“As Coach was saying, we’re grateful. Up until now we’ve been 10 for 10 in getting games played. That’s certainly, we’re fortunate. I counted up yesterday, when we were going through this, there have been 114 games canceled thus far this season. We’ve been fortunate not to be on that list up until now, but this week was an unfortunate one for us. We’ve enjoyed obviously the first part of this week, the announcement of College GameDay, the exposure we’ve gotten through that. I expect there will be a lot of discussion about Liberty and how the game kind of came about and also how the cancellation came about on the GameDay show on Saturday morning. I look forward to watching that.”
WHAT’S YOUR SENSE OF THE BOWL SITUATION WILL SHAKE OUT?
“We are very hopeful for a bowl opportunity, and certainly very deserving with the 9-1 record and top 25 ranking. I think bowl games will start to be selected as early as next week. I think it will be a staggered basis. I think as of now there are 9 or 10 games that have been canceled thus far, but we remain very hopeful about our opportunities. We’ll pause our team, but expect to bring them back sometime next week and prepare for a bowl game.”
DO YOU FEAR THAT PEOPLE WILL THINK YOU BAILED ON THIS MATCHUP?
“I don’t know how they could. I don’t know who would bail on an opportunity to play a top 25 game on College GameDay. That certainly was not the case as you heard from Coach Freeze. Our coaches and our team were very eager to play this game. Obviously, we have a great rivalry with Coastal Carolina, it was kind of a dream matchup in many ways. Again, we’re disappointed that it didn’t come to fruition, but we’ve got to put the health and well being of our staff and student-athletes first.”
THERE HAS BEEN DISCUSSION ABOUT LU/BYU GETTING A GAME SCHEDULED DEC. 19, WHAT CAN YOU SAY ABOUT THAT?
“We’ve certainly contemplated that as a possibility, but it does run into the beginning of the bowl season and most likely that would be when our bowl game would be, it would be on the front end of it. So, I think right now, we are kind of waiting to see how the bowl situation unfolds and we will go from there.”
CAN YOU TALK ABOUT SOME OF THE BOWL TIE-INS LIBERTY HAS? WITH SOME OF THE BOWL GAMES BEING CANCELED, ARE YOU UNEASY AT ALL ABOUT GETTING AN OPPORTUNITY?
“We have a contract with ESPN Events for, I think there are eight bowl tie-ins that they have. Those would be opportunity for placement for our team. We just really wait to hear from ESPN as to what opportunities may be presented to us. I think certainly one thing we have learned this year, is nothing is guaranteed, either the regular season or the bowl season. With all the games being canceled, and certainly we’ve seen already bowl games being canceled, we understand that there could be additional ones. This is a year of uncertainty and a year where you can’t guarantee anything, but at the same time I think certainly the performance of our team during the course of the year makes us very deserving of a bowl game and I expect the team will have that opportunity.”
FOR THIS TEAM TO GO 9-1, CAN YOU PUT THE SEASON INTO PERSPECTIVE?
“Certainly there is more work to be done, but to date you would have to say this is the most successful season in the history of our program, just a great credit to Coach Freeze and the team, just all the accomplishments going back through the two ACC wins, beating Virginia Tech and Syracuse, the incredible start, obviously. It has been a magical ride, and we expect that ride to continue a little longer after we complete our pause. The job that this coaching staff has done, if you think about it, just our second full year of an FBS program, to be nationally ranked and have an opportunity to get to 10 wins is really, we’re so far ahead of schedule, it’s really remarkable.”
YOU MENTIONED THIS GAME WITH COASTAL MAY BE RESCHEDULED, ANY INSIGHT TO WHEN IT MIGHT BE RESCHEDULED AND WHAT THE SERIES MIGHT LOOK LIKE?
“We will have to visit with Matt Hogue down at Coastal on that, but I think our games as we have them right now are 2023, 2024, ’27, ’28, and ’29. So, if we can do it earlier we will, but I would expect this game would be perhaps rescheduled around 2030 or something like that. I will be in a rocking chair by then, by the way.”
WERE YOU TRYING TO WORK OUT FUTURE GAMES WITH BYU AS WELL?
“The whole arrangement with BYU, we weren’t involved in that at all. We have a great relationship with Coastal and also a great relationship with BYU, we just at this point have the one series, the home and home with BYU, but certainly it would be possible to add games further down the road.”
THE FOOTBALL TEAM HAS HAD A GREAT RUN OF SUCCESS WITH COVID UNTIL THIS WEEK, BUT ARE YOU CONCERNED WITH THE UPTICK WITH FOOTBALL FOR BASKETBALL AND OTHER SPORTS?
“We feel our bubble system is as good as any out there. We’ve been highly successful with it, not just football but our basketball programs. Unfortunately, there’s a big uptick nationally right now, there’s a big uptick in the state of Virginia and even here in Lynchburg. There’s just a high case load. Unfortunately, nothing is impenetrable when it comes to COVID-19, that was certainly regrettable as it relates to football, but we feel great about our protocols, very good about the job our medical team and our whole staff have done, but it was unfortunate that we got hit hard this week.”
