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UA’s Ira Lee gets swarmed by Gonzaga defenders during their game last season. This year’s rematch will be postponed, if not canceled.

 Kelly Presnell / Arizona Daily Star 2019

When Pac-12 school CEOs voted last week to ban all sports competition until January, they not only surprised some of their own basketball programs but also shook up the rest of the sport.

As of now, only teams from the Pac-12 and Ivy League are not being allowed to play basketball until at least January, leaving even more questions in a sport that has already begun limited preseason workouts at many schools.

Since the Pac-12’s announcement, NCAA senior VP of basketball Dan Gavitt has discussed playing regional basketball bubbles in November and December — presumably without Pac-12 schools, although Colorado coach Tad Boyle said he hopes the conference would reconsider its January mandate if safe early season events can be put together.

ESPN Events, which runs a number of made-for-TV early season events has had holes shot in every one of its events that signed up a Pac-12 team. That includes the NIT Season Tip-Off, which was scheduled to include Arizona, and the Wooden Legacy, which included Arizona last season and was scheduled to include UCLA this season.

Meanwhile, Gonzaga suddenly saw its games with Arizona and two other Pac-12 teams open up while Baylor saw its game with Oregon in the Dec. 19 “Pac-12 Coast-to-Coast Challenge” disappear. The Zags and Bears decided to play each other instead.

And locally, all this has kept Ryan Reynolds’ phone buzzing. As UA’s director of basketball operations and chief scheduler, Reynolds said he’s heard from ESPN Events officials about the NIT situation, while Gonzaga and previously scheduled home opponents such as Cal Baptist and Loyola Marymount have been in touch.

At this point, they don’t have much to talk about.

“I think everybody, all of college basketball, is kind of in a scheduling limbo right now,” Reynolds said. “You just don’t know what to do.”

It isn’t clear whether UA will be on the hook for the nearly six-figure guarantees it pays each single-game nonconference opponent such as Cal Baptist and LMU (who are contracted to receive $90,000 each).

However, if the Pac-12 remains the only major conference to pull its teams out of pre-New Year’s play, it is likely that its “force majeure” clauses — in which neither party is held liable if an event is canceled for reasons neither can control — would not apply because the games were not canceled across the board.

Then again, maybe nobody will play until January. Gavitt said this week the NCAA will announce by mid-September if the season would start on time Nov. 10 or face a “short-term” delay. A tentative start date must be known next month because teams are normally allowed to start full-length practices six weeks before games begin.

“We recognize that we are living and operating in an uncertain time, and it is likely that mid-September will be just the first milestone for many important decisions pertaining to the regular season and the NCAA basketball championships,” Gavitt said. “While circumstances may warrant flexibility resulting in a different and perhaps imperfect season, the ultimate goal is to safely provide student-athletes and teams with a great college basketball experience.”

Gavitt said the NCAA has “developed and studied” a variety of contingency plans for alternatives to the Nov. 10 start, which NCAA.com’s Andy Katz said could include a start the weekend before, during or after Thanksgiving.

There have also been discussions that ESPN Events could lump some of its November events together at the same time, perhaps even at the same Disney World site in Florida that the NBA is now running its playoffs, with similar “bubble” precautions such as regular testing and strict controls on players’ mobility.

Gavitt and NCAA selection committee chair Mitch Barnhart said last week that holding mini-bubble events during the period between Thanksgiving and New Year’s — when most college students around the country will be finishing up their semesters off campus or on break — would be a good opportunity.

UA coach Sean Miller has not been available for comment other than a statement he made last week supporting the decision, but AD Dave Heeke said “we’re pretty convinced that we’re moving towards January” even for basketball.

“I’m not a person that would not consider it,” Heeke said. “Could something change that allows us to consider it? I don’t see that, but if there is an abundance of evidence and our medical advisory group was entertaining that, we could have that conversation. But I don’t see us working on that immediately.”

Heeke said he does see the possibility of bubbles being created for the Pac-12 season, even with questions over testing and other protocols remaining, and has talked to Miller and UA women’s basketball coach Adia Barnes about it.

“We’re on the same page, and the NBA and WNBA have shown a pathway,” Heeke said. “But we’ve got to get back to,’Are we comfortable and ready to do the right kind of testing, even if we’re in bubble environments? And are we comfortable with all of the potential ramifications of COVID-19?’

“So until we have certainty on those things, or a better comfort level on those, I think we’re going to be very, very cautious.”

Rim shots

  • Prolific Prep of Napa, California, has hired former UA associate head coach Mark Phelps to be the head coach of its powerhouse high school program. Phelps had been working as West Coast Elite’s 17U team since UA let his contract expire in June 2019 following his removal from the staff after he was reportedly accused of tampering with a recruit’s academic records.
  • Former UA assistant coach Book Richardson recorded an introductory video podcast for Silver Waves Media, in which he said he would discuss the “dark days” he experienced before and during his three-month imprisonment related to the college basketball investigation. “I think those things are therapeutic for me, now that I can talk about them,” Richardson said.

Richardson is now working for the New York Gauchos club program in addition to his media work for Silver Waves, which is affiliated with West Coast Elite.

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