The U.S. Federal Aviation Administration’s decision to ground all flights nationwide for several hours Friday threw the sports world into chaos, leaving NBA, NHL and college teams scrambling to reach their destinations in time for games this weekend.
Transportation officials cited “extraordinary circumstances” caused by communications issues at regional air traffic control centers for the stoppage. It left some teams searching for hotel rooms, others rescheduling flights, leagues adjusting start times, and some teams had even taken the extraordinary step of chartering buses rather than waiting for the ground stop to end.
“We’re going to allow for general aviation, those larger movements, to take place as a priority. Smaller movements will take lower priority,” Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy said after the ground stop was lifted Friday night in Washington.
“If you’re talking about football teams moving,” Duffy continued, when asked about the sports landscape, “many of those are charters, and there’s a lot of individuals on those charter planes, so I would encourage those football teams to reach out to the FAA to schedule those flight times, so they can move and make sure we have games going off tomorrow.”
U.S. flights cleared to take off again after ground stop order caused thousands of delays and cancellations
Most college football teams playing Saturday travel the day before their game, and the stoppage left many schools — including No. 2 Utah, eighth-ranked Texas and No. 9 Tennessee — at a standstill as they departed for road games. The Utes play at No. 22 Arizona, the Longhorns visit No. 24 LSU and the Vols are traveling to Texas A&M in three of the bigger games of the weekend.
“The Southeastern Conference is aware of the FAA’s nationwide ground stop and the potential impact on team travel,” the league said. “We are in close communication with our member institutions to assess potential disruptions and coordinate appropriate responses.
“The safety and well-being of student-athletes, coaches and team personnel remain our highest priority.”
Texas and Tennessee both returned to their campuses during the ground stoppage. Once it was lifted following more than four hours of uncertainty, the schools began making plans to fly out as soon as possible, allowing them to arrive before game day.
Auburn opted to take a bus to Mississippi State with the SEC pushing back the Saturday start time from noon EST to 4:15 p.m. to give the Tigers a little buffer. Purdue likewise decided to board buses from West Lafayette, Indiana, for its game at Iowa.
Other schools affected by the stoppage included Baylor, Washington, Kansas State, Minnesota and No. 19 Ole Miss, which said it did not plan on flying to Oklahoma for its game against the Sooners until Saturday morning.
The Big 12 said late Friday that the Kansas-West Virginia game scheduled for 5:30 p.m. EST would be moved up to 3:30 p.m. since the Jayhawks arrived in plenty of time. That allowed the league to shift the Arizona State-UCF game from 2:30 p.m. EST to 5:30 p.m., giving the Sun Devils an additional three hours after their flight from Arizona to Florida was delayed.
Washington spokesman Kurt Svoboda said the Huskies returned to campus when their flight was grounded, but officials stayed in touch with their Alaska/Hawaiian Airlines partners and the flight crew remained in place. The Huskies ultimately flew out late Friday for their game at Michigan State on Saturday.
Florida State was playing at Pittsburgh on Friday night, while Illinois was visiting fourth-ranked UCLA and No. 14 Houston was visiting Colorado. Those teams were hoping their charter flights home afterward would be unaffected by the upheaval.
It was unclear whether any referees, who typically fly to their assignments the day before games, would have trouble reaching their games. The Big Ten said in a statement that all of its officials had arrived for their scheduled assignments Saturday.
Several teams were able to take off before the stoppage began, including all of those traveling in the Atlantic Coast Conference; Missouri, which was flying to top-ranked Georgia; Duke, which was visiting fifth-ranked Miami; and No. 10 Texas Tech, which posted on social media images of its arrival for a game at Oklahoma State.
NFL teams playing Sunday typically travel the day before their games. They were expected to fly as planned on Saturday.
In the NBA, the Cleveland Cavaliers played in Miami on Friday night but won’t fly home until Saturday morning and plan to land about eight hours before a home game against the Dallas Mavericks. NBA teams hardly ever fly in on the day of a game, but there have been some circumstances — often weather-related — where it has happened.
At least two other NBA teams had Friday night flights pushed to Saturday morning, but those teams aren’t playing Saturday night. Cleveland scrambled to get hotel rooms re-booked in Miami, after checking out of their hotel earlier Friday.
“It’s part of it. You just adapt,” Cleveland coach Kenny Atkinson said.
There are 14 scheduled games in the NHL on Saturday. The Panthers were among the majority that made it to their destinations before the stoppage began. The Sharks, who were left waiting in San Jose to see whether they would be able to travel, arrived later Friday in Utah.
JuJu Watkins and her third-ranked Southern California teammates were trying to get to South Carolina for their game Sunday against the top-ranked Gamecocks. The team had just boarded its flight at Los Angeles International Airport when the ground stop was issued. After a while, the decision was made to deboard passengers and the team returned to the Galen Center.
In soccer, the Utah Royals already were in the Washington, D.C., area ahead of their National Women’s Soccer League semifinal against the Washington Spirit on Saturday. But the Kansas City Current were supposed to depart Friday for their semifinal against Gotham FC on Sunday in New York, and team officials were uncertain when their flight would be allowed to leave.
The U.S. national team’s match against Haiti on Saturday in Miami was unaffected by the ground stop. Both teams and officials already were in town for the first leg of the two-match CONCACAF Nations League quarterfinal series.
