It’s been more than a decade since he last traveled on the sidelines of Michigan Stadium – “The Big House” – coaching the Wolverines football team opposed to other Big Ten Conference powers like Ohio State and Nebraska in front of more than 100,000 fans.

But this past week Lloyd Carr said his mind was awash with many memories from his University of Michigan coaching days, particularly the first year (1995) he was head coach and his son Jason was on the team. Carr said when he heard the news earlier this week that the Big Ten was one of several college athletic conferences cancelling their fall sports seasons due to the coronavirus pandemic, it was an emotional wallop, tinged with many layers.    

Carr, who led the Wolverines to a much senior record in the 1997 season, heading to Michigan crowned national champion through the Associated Press after a Rose Bowl victory over Washington state, said he had spoken to Brian Griese, the quarterback of that Michigan’s ’97. team name last week and that the two men reflected on how Griese debated between returning for her fifth year or moving on after the 1996 season.

“Somewhere along the line, you have to look at it and honestly do what’s best for the players. Because there’s so much we don’t know about this virus,” said Carr. “There’s risk. And if there is football played by the conferences that are going to play, if they can go through a season and have success, it’s going to be a thing that becomes even more hard to deal with, because our decision in the Big Ten went the other direction. 

“Any decision, whatever it is, what are the threats? That’s what the Big Ten decided: the too great threat,” Carr continued. “The SEC, the big 12 and the CCA have not yet made that decision. At the heart of this threat is the player and other people around the program. Just wait and pray it works.

Monetary losses for a Division I like Michigan are staggering if there is no school football. Marc Ganis, president of Chicago-based sports marketing company Sportscorp Ltd., said top elite school athletics systems use revenue from football and men’s basketball to fund other sports.

I am an award-winning sports research journalist who spent 16 years at the New York Daily News and has written for ESPN, USA Today, NBC, Athletic, The New York Post, New York Times and Washington Post. I’m a two-book co-author and I have my own podcast, “Stories with Street CRed.”