Everything is canceled. Buy reasonable amounts of toilet paper and only talk to people who can't hear you. Wash your hands. Listen to what state and local officials are saying. Stop putting your hands in my water (<—mostly applicable to area one-year-olds).

Trying to un-cancel themselves. I still had the condensed recap of the Maryland game in a tab, and I watched a bit of it. Simpson hit that floater over Sticks in the second half and it occurred to me that was close to the last thing Simpson did in a Michigan uniform. Tremendously sad that he and a bunch of other seniors have had their careers terminated before they got their shot.

A number of NCAA athletes are petitioning for an extra year of eligibility:

Wahrman pulled up Change.org and got to work. She created a petition, then shared it with teammates and friends. It quickly spread to friends of friends and beyond. Across Iowa’s campus, and then across others. It ticked past 1,000 digital signatures, then 5,000, then 10,000. Around 18 hours after its creation, it was at 90,000 and rapidly climbing.

It had begun to feel like a movement. And that evening on ESPN, UConn women’s basketball coach Geno Auriemma had given it a prominent voice.

The prospect of recompensed eligibility, Auriemma explained, had been raised even before the NCAA went nuclear. “My feeling is this,” the Hall of Famer said. “It’s an unprecedented event. So you have to take unprecedented measures.

“You can’t say this year never happened, and wipe away everything,” he continued. “Because some teams had amazing seasons, incredible accomplishments, they should not be diminished, and shouldn’t be wiped away.

“In terms of each individual, I would be in favor of allowing all those that were seniors, that have not had a chance to compete, not had a chance to play their spring season, they should be given another opportunity to play. Regardless of what that does to your scholarship count. And the NCAA should foot the bill for that.”

One of the nation’s most influential athletic directors supported the movement as well. "I would like to see us look seriously at providing an additional year of eligibility for student athletes who have lost the opportunity to compete,” Oklahoma AD Joe Castiglione said. “Certainly that starts with the student athletes in their final year of eligibility. There’s not another way to get that back. I don’t know how many student athletes would come back and compete if they had an additional year of eligibility, that’s all speculative. But it’s certainly something we’re going to continue to discuss."

That's a logistical nightmare and a half. Teams have been planning for life without their seniors and even if you expand the allowable number of players you're disrupting minutes and roles pretty much everywhere. The number of transfers that would cause is potentially large.

Still might happen. It would be good press for an organization that desperately needs it, and it's got some high profile backers already. I wonder if smaller schools will nix it because they can't afford it, but the P5 can set some of their own rules now.

[After THE JUMP: old reliable Graham Couch]

At least the championship won't get vacated. Kansas is continuing its policy of maximum NCAA defiance, to the point of arguing that Adidas employees who stated in federal trials they were trying to recruit players to Kansas do not qualify as boosters:

Kansas goes on to argue that each allegation the NCAA makes in the case is based off the assertion that Adidas and its employees and consultants represented KU's athletic interests, which would qualify them as boosters. Through testimony at federal trials, one ex-Adidas consultant, TJ Gassnola, testified he worked on behalf of KU to get high profile players to play for Self at Kansas.

The verbiage is maximum asshole lawyerese:

"The allegations directed at Self are based on a misguided, unprecedented, and meritless interpretation and application of NCAA booster and recruiting legislation," Kansas said in its response.

I want the NCAA to give up on amateurism; I also want to see Kansas immolated. 

Maybe make the games less terrible to go to. Dennis Dodd notes that CFB attendance keeps declining. As per usual it's couched in "how could this be happening?" rhetoric:

At a Google innovation hub last week, administrative leaders from each of the Power Five conferences were invited to what amounted to a two-day think tank in Santa Monica, California. Google does it all the time, inviting experts from different walks of life just to … contemplate the world.

"It sounds nebulous, but it was one of the better professional days of my life," said Brad Wurthman, Virginia Tech senior associate athletic director. "Just being able to sit there and have them educate us on where the world is headed."

Part of that athletic world -- part of the Google experience last week -- is fan engagement. How to keep folks interested in the college product.

"To put it bluntly, it was a very smart person which followed another very smart person which followed a very smart person which followed another very smart person," Wurthman said. "We were all chuckling, 'We get it. You guys are geniuses.'"

None of them have been able to figure out what has become a chronic problem in college football. Once again the sport's attendance is down.

Geniuses who can't figure out that charging ever more money to sit through 10 commercial breaks a quarter might cause attendance decreases. Are the athletic directors out of touch? No, it's the fans who are wrong.

One interesting bit is that even Alabama is finding it difficult to schedule neutral site games:

After the 2021 season, no more. Alabama has scheduled seven home-and-home series against Power Five opponents from 2023-33. During that decade, fans will get to see Texas, Wisconsin, Florida State, West Virginia, Notre Dame, Georgia Tech and Oklahoma.

"The most valuable content is good, live contests on our campuses," Byrne said. "I've talked to schools who could have another [schedule] hole there to do a neutral-site game. No interest. They want content on their campuses."

We've finally reached the point where schools have to consider the impact on their season ticket bases when they schedule something daft. Most schools, anyway: Michigan canceled a home and home against UCLA for no apparent reason recently.

Couch levity in tough times. Reliable:

he really is just about the dumbest person in America with a keyboard pic.twitter.com/2vFQKMZIzc

— Steve (@IlliniToffee) March 11, 2020

We may not have sports, but we have dunking on Graham Couch, which is kind of sports.

Terrance Williams on his recruitment. Juwan Howard was a major selling point:

He visited Ann Arbor in late December, taking in Michigan's 86-60 win over UMass-Lowell on Dec. 29. . At Crisler Center, fans sidled up to Howard for photos and autographs. According to Williams, Howard didn't turn down a single request.

The gesture stood out.

“I think he’s very, very honest, and he’s really, really genuine and real," Williams said. "Like when I was on my visit, he interacted with all the fans. He talked to everybody. We were getting stopped, and Coach Martelli was like, ‘You can’t keep taking pictures, you’re holding everybody up.’

"But that’s just how Juwan is. He’s a genuine person. That’s something that I love about him.”

He's optimistic Michigan will get Isaiah Todd on campus.

"Imagine what would happen if Robinson had to expend all his energy just to stop being a net-negative on defense. He would have no energy left to shoot threes. Is that what you sickos want?" –guy who put this clip reel together

Duncan Robinson's historic season. Another unfortunate thing about sports being canceled is that it prohibits Duncan Robinson from chasing some crazy numbers:

There’s no one in the NBA who plays like Duncan Robinson. That makes sense, considering there’s no one in the NBA who got there the way Robinson did.

The Heat forward is putting together one of the greatest shooting seasons of all-time in his first full year in the league. Robinson is hitting 44.6 percent of his shots from behind the arc, but his accuracy alone doesn’t capture the impact of his shooting. What makes Robinson special is his accuracy on such immense volume. Of his 9.3 field goal attempts per game, 8.1 come from three-point range. It’s helped him compile a 67.4 true shooting percentage that ranks top-10 in the NBA and has him tied for the lead with any non-center.

Robinson was at his best as the Heat beat the Magic on Wednesday. He finished the game with 27 points on 9-of-12 shooting, with every attempt coming from three-point range. It was the third time Robinson had hit nine or more threes in a single game — joining Stephen Curry, James Harden, Klay Thompson, and Buddy Hield as the only players to ever do it.

Various fancystats have him one of the top 30 players in the league this season. He's what I thought Nik Stauskas would be. Truly incredible he was playing at the DIII level.

Flyers GM on Cam York. Charlie O'Connor has some uncommonly candid takes from a front office guy in the Athletic. The relevant bit for Michigan fans is that it sounds like the Flyers are on the fence about trying to sign York this offseason:

Do you think it’s possible he could be a one-and-done and turn pro after this season?

Again, I don’t even like to talk about that for those kids and put pressure on them. All those kids think they’re ready for the NHL. If you asked them at (the U.S. national) development team and at the combine last year, they’re all one-and-dones. But the league’s hard. I think you’ve got to be mindful of where they’re at physically and where they need to get to before you rush them into the American (Hockey) League — it’s a hard league, too, if you’re young and a physically undeveloped player.

We’ll make those decisions, again, after (the season), but I do think there’s merits for both sides of it for him. I think mentally, he’s ready. I think skill set-wise, he’s ready. But whether (he’s) physically ready? I don’t know. I don’t have that answer for you.

Sounds like they'd have no intention of looking at him for the NHL next year. I gather that the Flyers have a pretty set D corps.

Meanwhile, Johnny Beecher's second-half breakout ended up a little muted for good reason:

Well I guess now that the season’s over I can say it...

Johnny did this with a broken right thumb, which he’s been playing with since Feb. 17 https://t.co/WCaz7dtY2w

— Bailey Johnson (@BaileyAJohnson_) March 12, 2020

A healthy Beecher in year two with some dudes on his line could be a thing. Hopefully we get to see that sophomore season.

Etc.: Ethan Sears on Hayden Lavigne, who watched most of this hockey season. Wolverbear explained: the same guy did 24 different variations on angry sailor hat mascot over the course of a 45-year career. German soccer fan culture is intense. Beecher profiled by Bailey Johnson. Brendan Brisson checks in at the tail end of another first round.