USF Football Postpones FAU Game Following COVID-19 Cases At Notre Dame

WUSF | By Mark Schreiner

Published September 24, 2020 at 7:53 AM EDT

Notre Dame beat USF 52-0 on Sept. 19. Both teams have stopped on-field activities after a number of ND players tested positive for coronavirus following the game.

This Saturday's football game between the University of South Florida and Florida Atlantic University has been postponed.

USF paused all on-field activities earlier Wednesday after seven players at the University of Notre Dame - which beat USF 52-0 in South Bend, Indiana, this past Saturday - tested positive for coronavirus.

“With the health and safety of our student-athletes and staff as well as mitigating the spread of the virus as our primary concern, given the outbreak among team members of our most recent opponent and subsequent contract tracing within our team, postponement of this Saturday’s game at FAU is the right thing to do,” USF Vice President of Athletics Michael Kelly said.

“We were aware going into this season and have seen across the country that dealing with COVID-19 and taking the necessary precautions to mitigate its spread will present ongoing challenges. We are prepared to deal with those challenges and move forward in a safe manner,“ added Kelly. “We will resume on-field team activities once our medical professionals are comfortable with us doing so and will work in good faith with FAU to identify a future date to reschedule the game.”

The Atlantic Coast Conference announced Notre Dame has postponed this weekend's game against Wake Forest to Dec. 12 as a result of the news.

USF conducted a review of the video from the Notre Dame game for the purpose of contract tracing before making the announcement.

Members of the USF team were tested the day before the Notre Dame game and again Monday. All of those tests came back negative.

More testing of the entire team took place Wednesday.

USF and FAU are working on potential dates for rescheduling the game. It would be a reunion of sorts, as FAU is led by head coach Willie Taggart and defensive coordinator Jim Leavitt, USF's third and first head coaches, respectively.

Florida Atlantic's season opener scheduled for this past Saturday at Georgia Southern was postponed after 11 members of FAU tested positive for COVID-19.