There is plenty of debate these days about what will happen with the 2020 college football season. Will it happen? If it does, will fans be able to attend?

Everything is up in the air as we continue to deal with the COVID-19 pandemic, but there has been some interesting discussion this week.

On Friday, NCAA president Mark Emmert said he can’t imagine having college sports this year if universities have to go to an online-only class format (via USA TODAY):

“We would much rather relax some of those competitive-equity issues than ever put a young man or young woman at risk, physically or mentally,” Emmert said during a live conversation on the NCAA’s Twitter channel.

As for the appropriate academic environment for sports to begin, Emmert said: “College athletes are college students, and you can’t have college sports if you don’t have college (campuses) open and having students on them. You don’t want to ever put student-athletes at greater risk than the rest of the student body.”

That, of course, runs in stark contrast to what Big 12 commissioner Bob Bowlsby said this week (which was a change of heart for him):

“School has to be in session because football players on college teams are student-athletes. You have to be going to college,” Bowlsby said. “That doesn’t necessarily mean that if the new normal becomes online education, in part or in whole, that football players or volleyball players or soccer players couldn’t be taking classes online just like the rest of the students.

“I suspect some institutions may be a hundred percent online. And if they are, and if that is also what student-athletes are doing, I think that meets the criteria.”

It’s worth wondering what sort of power the NCAA has in situations like this, as there has been some conversation about moving away from the NCAA model.

This discussion is ongoing, so we’ll see what happens in the coming weeks.