The Matt Thomas Show with Ross - Joseph Duarte Joins To Discuss The Cancelling Of Houston vs. Baylor

Episode Date: September 18, 2020

Joseph Duarte Joins To Discuss The Cancelling Of Houston vs. Baylor

Hey guys, Lance Cullors. Regular season through postseason. Straight shots, pop a bottle. October happens here. Play in October. Listen to the home of the Astros, Sports Talk 790. Wind to 37 on Sports Talk 790. Those of you on hold, we'll get to you in a couple of minutes.

Let's bring in our friend Joseph Dwarte from the Houston Chronicle. He covers the University of Houston. Joseph, you just retweeted Ross Dellinger's report from SI. Apparently, there is a combination of positive. and tracing among the bare offensive line that has put them below the Big 12 minimum threshold. What more do you know or can you add off of that?

Well, no, there's not much more to add, Matt. The way the protocol goes, you know, each school, whether it's the Big 12 or the American, they do testing three times a week. This has all happened in the last few hours that Houston was notified. And it's similar to what we saw for the North Carolina game that was canceled this week.

it's between contact tracing and positive tests, you know, taking out an entire position group. And it happened to be, according to the offensive line. But, you know, this is just a – you knew something like this could eventually happen during the season. We've seen it happen to other schools. And now Houston's just the latest school to have to deal with this. I guess if you're looking at it from a Houston side, it's fortunate. They did not have any positive tests, and they were ready to play. So I think the big thing in this, Matt, is all.

Also, this will not affect the future home and home series that was contingent on this game being played. According to the release, Baylorson out, that series is still on. Yeah, but nobody cares about that right now, honestly. I mean, I know it's good for the long term. Let me ask you this. Now, I read that Sikkim 365 report. And again, I used those with very, very, it was hesitancy to say the least. The report they had basically did not attribute any positive cases to anybody that was.

associated with the team there were six negative tests. So is this more about contact tracing than anything else? Or are we just speculating at this point? I believe it's more contact tasting because I talked to a source with the Baylor program, and I was told that it was just the one position group and that they unexpectedly fell under the minimum threshold. So basically, it didn't indicate whether it was positive, but it sounded more like contact tracing because at that point, you don't have those bodies, available. You can't go out and safely pay the game. I don't think it's safe. We're talking

a huge outbreak within the program of positive tests, but the way that the testing goes, that there was some concern in terms of who would be available. And I think there's also some disappointment because I'm not quite sure what the protocol is for if you could retest or how quickly, but there was enough that happened early this morning that through likely the contact tracing that they just weren't going to have enough offensive linemen to play this game. Do we know what the threshold is? Do we know an exact number or is that being kept privately? You know, I don't think it's one of those numbers that's private. I don't know that one, Matt, but you look at what teams typically use. I believe we've seen games, you know, with Houston last year,

eight or nine offensive linemen maybe closer to 10 is what the rotation is depending on guys that you sub out and for injuries. So if you're looking at if it was below the threshold, you know, they either didn't have the five necessary to line up and offensive line, or they would have very few, if any, backups available if something happened. So that's probably where this thing is going and why they felt the need that they had to cancel the game. As I've talked about on my show, I don't see this game being played this year. This was kind of the perfect storm because both teams needed a week to play a game. both had cancellation. So I don't envision this trying to be fixed at this point this season. Boy, this is got to be a gut punch to the kids who have basically been in preparation mode for

two straight weeks for two different opponents in zero games. It's just another example. I think Joseph of how much 2020 blows. And well, that's what Dana Hoverson said during your interview with him yesterday, that, you know, when the Memphis news started to come out a week ago today, a lot of the kids knew about it through Twitter, and he was afraid, what am I going to tell these years? They were coming up to me saying, you know, what's going on, coach? And he didn't know, and the fact that if they didn't schedule another game, how was he going to keep them motivated or juiced up to practice an entire week with no opponent? So, yeah, there's a lot of discipline. I'm with you.

I don't see this game being played. Baylor starts conference play next week. Houston has their allegedly their first game against North Texas. It'll be at home. And then, you know, the Memphis game, I think, is being pretty close to being finalized where we might get an announcement on Monday when that makeup's going to be. There's just not enough spots left to start feeling these games back in. So it's kind of move ahead and hope that you can get some of these games down the road. Well, you know, as Dan has also said, this could happen again.

And we were kind of envisioning that this was not going to be a schedule that was going to be set in stone. It's a it's a it's a it's a sucker punch. It's a hit to the gut. I mean, you had buses, you had hotels. I'm packed. Not that I make any difference. You're already there, right? You went to go see a friend, correct?

Yeah, I'm in Waco. So, yeah, I mean, there's a lot of things that go into the planning. You know, they joke that this was probably the quickest game put together in modern history in terms of these games being scheduled way in advance. But, you know, if you're Houston now, how does that? they come out next week. You've got to, you know, you probably give the kids the weekend or at least until Sunday now to just get out, get it out of their mind at the disappointment. But, I mean, this probably isn't going to be the last time. And you start getting into the conference play,

you start getting more games played. You know, we knew this was going to be a weird and unusual season. And it's certainly been that. I believe this puts it up to 15 cancellations already during the first, you know, two weeks. Safe travels back. I'm sure Gavin will be happy to see his dad soon than anything thought. He sure will. Thank you for the time. We'll see you later. Joseph D'Orte from The Chronicle with us here on Sports Talk 790.