A hurricane barreling its way up the East Coast has had its first impact on Week 6, but it likely won’t be the last.
In a release, UCF and Tulane announced that they have reached an agreement in postponing their football game this weekend to Saturday, Nov. 5. The two teams had been scheduled to play in Orlando Friday night, but the impact of Hurricane Matthew triggered the decision to push the game back to early next month.
Both teams have a bye for Week 9, making the move easier on all involved.
“Taking into account all the latest projections for Hurricane Matthew, we have to keep the safety of everyone involved in these events at the forefront of our decision-making,” UCF athletic director Dr. Daniel J. White said in a statement. “We appreciate our friends at Tulane and Houston understanding and working with us through this situation. Mike Aresco and the American Athletic Conference staff has been very helpful, as well.”
In addition to that game, the UMass-Old Dominion in Norfolk, Va., that had been scheduled for 6 p.m. ET Saturday evening has been moved to Friday night at 8 p.m. local time. The projected path of Matthew has the storm hitting that area late Saturday night.Hurricane Matthew is coming Saturday night/ Sunday AM. We will move our 🏈Game with @UMassFootball to Friday night at 800pm @ODUFootball.
— Bobby Wilder (@ODUCoachWilder) October 5, 2016
For Power Five games such as LSU-Florida in Gainesville, Florida State-Miami in Miami Gardens, Virginia Tech-North Carolina in Chapel Hill, Notre Dame-North Carolina State in Raleigh and Georgia-South Carolina in Columbia, the schools and conferences continue to monitor the situation, although, as of this posting, all of those games are scheduled to go off as planned. The governor of South Carolina was quoted as saying she “can’t imagine” the UGA-USC being played as scheduled, and there has been talk of moving the game to the Georgia Dome in Atlanta, although Gamecock officials reportedly haven’t spoken to anyone at that venue about shift.
One note: Georgia’s volleyball team was scheduled to travel to South Carolina for a game in Columbia Friday night; the schools announced earlier today that, because of Hurricane Matthew, that game has been moved to Athens. Additionally, USC has closed its campus Thursday and Friday and cancelled all classes in preparation for the storm’s arrival.