College basketball hit hard by COVID-19 cancellations: Kansas vs. Colorado canceled; Louisville paused

The emergence of the Omicron variant has prompted an outbreak of COVID-19 issues across American sports. In recent days college basketball has taken on dozens of COVID pauses at programs throughout the country, the latest impacting two of the biggest programs in the sport.

Kentucky and Louisville announced Monday that their annual rivalry game, scheduled for Wednesday, has been canceled due to multiple COVID positives in Louisville’s program. Kentucky pivoted to play a rare home game vs. Western Kentucky instead. Because of the cancellation, 2021 marks the first time since the 1981-82 season that Kentucky and Louisville will not play. 

It’s the latest hit for men’s college basketball, which also saw big-time schools such as UCLA, Ohio State, USC, Memphis and Syracuse announce pauses right before or over the weekend. A complete list of schools on halt can be see below.

Between cancellations and postponements, more than 50 games have been impacted in the first six weeks this season.

Impact of canceled games

The cancellations have impacts for intra-conference games, as leagues have instituted forfeit rules for the 2021-22 season. Seton Hall was incapable of playing St. John’s on Tuesday, so the Big East stuck to its code agreed to in the fall and docked the Pirates with a loss in league play, while St. John’s started 1-0 in the conference due to the SHU forfeit. The same applied to Georgetown, which could not play vs. Providence, so it took a loss. In the Pac-12,  Washington was incapable of finding a makeup game vs. UCLA earlier in December, so the Huskies were assessed a forfeit and UCLA was given a win in the conference standings.

Forfeits are not recognized officially by the NCAA selection committee, so any games not played as initially scheduled will not be reflected on team sheets. 

Teams affected by COVID-19

Here is the list of schools affected by COVID-19 protocols, which will be updated as necessary, should more schools need to be added. Last updated: Tuesday at 1:15 p.m. ET.

1. Akron (currently paused)
2. Abilene Christian
3. Binghamton (currently paused)
4. Boston College (currently paused)
5. Bryant (currently paused)
6. Chicago State (currently paused)
7. Cleveland State (currently paused)
8. Colorado (currently paused)
9. Colorado State (currently paused)
10. Coppin State (currently paused)
11. Cornell (currently paused)
12. DePaul (currently paused)
13. Drexel (currently paused)
14. Evansville (currently paused)
15. FIU (currently paused)
16. Florida State (currently paused)
17. Fordham (currently paused)
18. Hampton (currently paused)
19. Georgetown (currently paused)
20. Georgia State
21. Grand Canyon (currently paused)
22. Long Beach State (currently paused)
23. Louisville (currently paused)
24. Loyola Chicago (currently paused)
25. Loyola Maryland (currently paused)
26. Memphis (currently paused)
27. Morgan State (currently paused)
28. Nevada
29. Northeastern (currently paused)
30. Northern Illinois (currently paused)
    
    
31. Ohio State (currently paused)
32. Oregon State
33. Penn State (currently paused)
34. Purdue Fort Wayne (currently paused)
35. Rhode Island (currently paused)
36. Rice (currently paused)
37. Rutgers (currently paused)
38. Saint Joseph’s (currently paused)
39. Seton Hall 
40. St. Francis Brooklyn (currently paused)
41. Syracuse (currently paused)
42. Texas Southern (currently paused)
43. Tulane (currently paused)
44. UCLA (currently paused)
45. UC Riverside (currently paused)
46. USC (currently paused)
47. VCU (currently paused)
48. Wagner
49. Washington