Last year, it was Hurricane Irma that had a significant impact on the early portion of the college football schedule. This year, it’s yet another significant Atlantic storm set to wreak havoc on the sport.
Hurricane Florence, elevated from a Category 3 to Category 4 storm Monday afternoon -- it could turn into a Category 5 before it’s all said and done -- is projected to make landfall in the mid-Atlantic at some point this week, most likely Thursday night or very early Friday morning. States of Emergency have already been issued for South Carolina, North Carolina, Virginia and Maryland, with governors from North Carolina, South Carolina and Virginia already ordering mandatory evacuations along those states’ coastline.
Already, Coastal Carolina’s game against FCS Campbell, scheduled for Saturday, has been moved up to Wednesday. Additionally, the game was moved from Coastal Carolina’s campus in South Carolina to Campbell’s stadium in North Carolina, which is roughly 140 miles north and significantly further inland.
The game most likely to be impacted next is Thursday night’s Boston College-Wake Forest game in Winston-Salem. Thus far, there’s been no official update from Wake on the status of that contest, which is scheduled for a 7:30 p.m. ET kickoff.
In addition to those two games, nearly a dozen others at the FBS level slated for Saturday could be affected in one way or another by Hurricane Florence, depending on which path the storm ultimately takes:
- No. 18 UCF at North Carolina, 12:00
- Temple at Maryland
- East Carolina at No. 13 Virginia Tech, 12:20
- Ohio at Virginia, 3:00
- Georgia Southern at No. 2 Clemson, 3:30
- No. 14 West Virginia at NC State, 3:30
- Southern Miss at Appalachian State, 3:30
- Old Dominion at Charlotte, 6:00
- Norfolk State at Liberty, 6:00
- Marshall at South Carolina, 7:30
On Twitter Monday, Virginia Tech athletic director Whit Babcock gave a hint as to a rough timeline for a decision being made for at least some of those games listed above.
Our staff & (obviously) many experts are monitoring weather situation in coordination w/ ACC, ECU & others. We may change this plan, but as of now, we will have an update re: game on Wednesday. Most likely nothing today or tomorrow. #staytuned. Thank you 👍🏽🦃
— Whit Babcock (@WhitBabcock) September 10, 2018
Our sources say NC State is refusing to come to Morgantown to play the game even if there was a 50/50 split at Mylan Puskar Stadium or even if NC State took all the profits. Our sources say WVU is trying to preserve Will Greir’s Heisman status and WVU wants the opportunity for an additional win.
If they do agree to reschedule, it will look like this: the NC State game would possibly be played on October 13th. Then WVU’s game with Iowa State would be pushed back to a Thursday night game on October 18th.
Around this time last season, Hurricane Irma impacted in the neighborhood of 10 games involving Florida’s FBS teams. Prior to that, Hurricane Harvey scuttled the Houston-UTSA game.
UPDATED 10:39 a.m. ET: One NC State official took to Twitter to refute the report that the game with West Virginia has already been canceled.
Not accurate at current time, all parties continue to discuss.
— Fred Demarest (@Fred_Demarest) September 11, 2018