Covid-19 and the sports season it has destroyed by. Thomas James Reynolds

With fears of the Covid-19 spreading and with more and more sporting organizations closing the Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference (MAAC) has decided to cancel the remainder of their men and women's basketball championships. Along with these cancellations comes the dissolution of the remaining games for all sports men and women's.

“In response to the immediate and ever-growing concerns regarding the Covid-19 pandemic, the Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference and it’s council of presidents have unanimously decided to cancel the remainder of its current conference tourney currently being held in Atlantic City, New Jersey. In addition, based upon the MACC memberships ongoing commitment to the health and safety of our student athletes and the athletic department representatives and as a result of the growing national concern of the Covid-19 pandemic the MAAC council of presidents has also unanimously voted to cancel all spring sports competitions. Practices (including captains practices) effective tomorrow march 13th and other athletic related activities for the remainder of the 2020 spring season.”

The announcement came at 2:30 p.m after a game in the women's tournament between Siena and Fairfield in which the game was played behind closed doors, without fans. This decision left both first seeds and the regular season champions, Siena for the mens and Rider for the women's as the automatic bids to the NCAA tournament.

“When it’s all said and done, you know, it’s all for the greater good,” said Siena men's basketball head coach Carmen Maciariello. “This is a real-world situation. People are dying and you have to be mindful of that.”

Later that night the NCAA, after much debate regarding Rudy Gobert of the Utah Jazz testing positive for the coronavirus, cancelled their March basketball tournaments. It will be the first time since 1938 that there will be no March Madness.

"This decision is based on the evolving COVID-19 public health threat, our ability to ensure the events do not contribute to the spread of the pandemic and the impracticality of hosting such events at any time during the academic year given the ongoing decisions by other entities," the NCAA said.

Before this decision was made public the NCAA faced many critics for not postponing or cancelling the games.

“The NCAA is always late to the party. I don’t think they give a damn about the players, the student-athlete. I think that’s their No. 1 asset, and I think religiously and continuously, they have shown a lack of respect and decency when it comes to the athletes. It was nice to see them join the party, but to me, it should have been done earlier. I keep bringing this up especially in light of the fact that the NBA had suspended its season. If you spend one extra minute thinking about dollars and cents over human life, you have revealed yourself to be pretty close to despicable”, Stephen A. Smith said on First Take Thursday morning.

The NCAA tournament cancellation coincides with abandonment of play in a lot of other major sports organizations such as the NHL and MLS. What is to happen with the start of the MLB season remains to be seen.