It was pretty obvious going into this year’s college football season things are going to look a little different from a fan point of view. With some colleges only allowing their stadiums to be at 25% capacity, schools all across the NCAA are trying their hardest to keep the season from going South.
After the Oklahoma football season opener against Missouri State with fans practically on top of each other in the student section and virtually no COVID-19 protocol being followed, the University of Oklahoma athletic department announced changes in the COVID-19 guidelines for student seating at Gaylord Family-Oklahoma Memorial stadium starting this weekend at the Oklahoma vs. Kansas State game.
What’s new?
The new measures put in place for the student section will include:
- Explicit designation of seating sections on student tickets to eliminate any previous confusion about proper location for student attendees.
- Clearer concourse signage at the entry ramps for student sections.
- Establishment of student seating clusters in groups of 2-10.
- Clearly delineated prohibited seating sections marked by flagging tape.
On top of the regulations put in place by OU’s athletic department, security personnel will see a hefty increase for the games to ensure proper social distancing and COVID-19 guidelines will be followed throughout the game.
These guidelines the school is putting in place may seem like it is putting a damper on the fan going experience. Remembering the fact that multiple schools are having to cancel games in light of spikes in COVID-19 cases on their campus, this seems to be enough to justify more drastic precautions.
Latest coronavirus data
On top of attempting to keep its students safe with the new guidelines, the university’s athletic department released its new COVID-19 percentages for all athletic staff and athletes early yesterday. The statistics revealed that among the 760 tested, only eight tests came back positive across all programs at the university. This means cases in the athletic department as a whole are at an all-time low since coming back to campus with only 1% of people testing positive.
With the guidelines OU is implementing along with stellar testing rates, fans should continue to plan on cheering on the Sooners for Saturdays to come.
