Five days after Bowling Green State University cut its baseball program, the players assembled on campus to clean out their lockers. When they entered, a staffer handed them black garbage bags.
That felt appropriate. The team had learned on a May 15 Zoom call that their baseball careers were over at BGSU. The school will honor all scholarships and will help anyone transfer who wants to, but the program that produced big leaguers including a pair of World Series champions, Orel Hershiser and Roger McDowell, was no more.
The coronavirus pandemic has left the school with a projected $29 million deficit for next year.