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Athletics

Fall sports to begin without fans at home events

This attendance restriction will last through September. Carolina Athletics will continue to work with medical experts and the University to evaluate safety conditions with the hope of increasing capacity in October.

View of Kenan Stadium and the water tower as seen from the Morehead-Patterson Bell Tower.
View of Kenan Stadium and the water tower as seen from the Morehead-Patterson Bell Tower on October 3, 2018, on the campus of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. (Johnny Andrews/UNC-Chapel Hill)

Dear Tar Heels,

As you know, COVID-19 continues to make a huge impact on our country, our community, our University and our Department of Athletics. We returned to campus, only to re-adjust to remote learning. We returned to practice, with some necessary pauses. Our student-athletes, coaches, staff – and you, our fans — have remained resilient through all of the changes, and we continue to appreciate your support of our student-athletes and teams, and their desire to compete.

Every adjustment we have made has been with the health of our student-athletes, coaches and staff, and Carolina community in mind, including this one: We will begin our fall sport seasons without fans at home events. This includes football, cross country, field hockey, men’s and women’s soccer and volleyball. This attendance restriction will last through September, and we will continue to work with medical experts and the University to evaluate safety conditions with the hope that we can increase capacity in October. Tailgating also will not be allowed on campus.

We know this is disappointing to you — our fans, donors, and supporters  — and our venues will not be the same without you there. We will particularly miss the energy, passion and Carolina Blue support of our students, who truly make game day special and unique. This decision, however, was the only way we could move forward with competition. Our student-athletes want to play, and we must do so as safely as possible. We made this decision in consultation with medical experts, our University, and state and local officials.

To those of you who were able to donate the price of football season tickets back to the department: thank you. To those who rolled your tickets over to 2021: we look forward to seeing you. And to those who we refunded, we hope we will see you in Kenan Stadium in the future.

We know you all will be cheering us on from home, and we’ll be in touch soon with opportunities for enhanced fan experiences from afar. We remain hopeful that we will be able to safely cheer together in large groups again this season. When that happens, we look forward to welcoming all of you back to campus.

Until then, thank you again for your continued support. Please stay safe and Go Heels!

Sincerely,

Bubba Cunningham
Director of Athletics