NEW ULM — Martin Luther College and the Upper Midwest Athletic Conference were the latest to shift gears regarding the 2020 fall sports season.

The college announced on Friday that there will be no football games played this fall, but instead there will be meeting and start practice on Monday, August 24. There is hope for an abbreviated season in the spring, but that has to be discussed amongst the rest of the schools in the UMAC.

“There is a proposal to the Athletic Directors (in the UMAC) that will be acted on next Friday (August 21) for a four to five game schedule in the spring,” MLC Director of Athletics Jim Unke said. “Basically we are just going to do our spring ball [football practices] in the fall, which is practicing just among ourselves.”

Unke said there will be no NCAA fall tournaments in the spring.

According to a press release from MLC, the volleyball team will play five dates (nine total matches) starting on Saturday, September 12, with one home match against St. Scholastica scheduled for Saturday, September 26. The soccer teams will play four games, with that schedule to be posted soon on the MLC athletics website.

Four other UMAC schools (North Central, Northland, Northwestern and St. Scholastica) make up the schedule for the volleyball and soccer seasons, and all four (along with MLC) have agreed to comply with the recommendations of the NCAA Sports Science Institute for COVID-19.

The golf and cross country seasons will start as scheduled, with both sports competing only against UMAC opponents.

“Over the last two months, we worked very hard to secure an opportunity for our student-athletes to compete this fall, while also making sure we don’t compromise the safety of those athletes, our campus family, and the New Ulm community,” Unke said in a press release from MLC. “We believe that these schedules provide that opportunity, and we are very pleased by the support we have received from our campus leadership in guaranteeing we have the testing capabilities to allow us to do so as safely as possible.”

(Information from this story came from the MLC Sports Information Department)