College football enters this week with 76 of the 130 programs still intending to play this season. With four of the 10 FBS conferences having already called off their seasons, a shroud of skepticism lingers over the sport.
The narrative in the National Football League, more than three weeks after rookies reported, is resoundingly different. While there have been occasional hiccups and 67 opt-outs, the NFL’s use of daily COVID-19 testing and cutting-edge contact tracing technology has fostered an air of inevitability about the season pushing forward.
So as college football sputters toward kickoff, it’s fair to ask what the sport could learn from the early success of the NFL.