FAA ground stop disrupts NBA, NHL and college team travel across US
The Federal Aviation Administration’s nationwide ground stop on Friday forced NBA, NHL and college teams across the United States to alter travel plans ahead of a packed weekend of games. Leagues, schools and teams scrambled to reschedule flights, charter buses and adjust start times after the stoppage.
Transportation officials blamed “extraordinary circumstances” caused by communications issues at regional air traffic control centers for the shutdown, which lasted more than four hours of uncertainty. After the ground stop was lifted on Friday night in Washington, the transportation secretary, Sean Duffy, said: “We’re going to allow for general aviation, those larger movements, to take place as a priority. Smaller movements will take lower priority.” Some teams searched for hotel rooms while others chose ground transport rather than wait.
No 19 Mississippi’s game at Oklahoma was moved from Saturday to Sunday at 1pm ET because of travel problems, a decision that drew criticism from Oklahoma athletic director Roger Denny. Denny said on X that “I understand that difficult decisions sometimes must be made under extraordinary circumstances,” and added: “Put simply, this decision isn’t fair to our athletes, our institution or to Sooner nation,” while accusing the Southeastern Conference of threatening Oklahoma with a forfeit if it did not agree to the change.
Many college programs that normally travel the day before games were stalled, including No 2 Utah, No 8 Texas and No 9 Tennessee, as they prepared to depart for road matchups. The Utes were due at No 22 Arizona, the Longhorns at No 24 LSU and the Volunteers at Texas A&M; the Southeastern Conference said: “The Southeastern Conference is aware of the FAA’s nationwide ground stop and the potential impact on team travel. The safety and well-being of student-athletes, coaches and team personnel remain our highest priority.” Texas and Tennessee returned to their campuses during the stoppage and began planning to fly out as soon as possible once it was lifted.
Auburn chartered a bus to Mississippi State and the SEC pushed Saturday’s kickoff back from noon ET to 4.15pm to allow more travel time for the Tigers, while Purdue chose to bus from West Lafayette to play at Iowa. Other affected schools included Baylor, Washington, Kansas State, Minnesota and Arizona State; the Big 12 moved Kansas-West Virginia from 5.30pm ET to 3.30pm, enabling the conference to shift Arizona State-UCF from 2.30pm to 5.30pm and give 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, that officials remained in contact with airline partners and that the flight crew stayed in place; Washington ultimately departed late on Friday for Michigan State, and that game was pushed back 75 minutes to 5.30pm ET. There were also concerns about game officials reaching assignments, though the Big Ten said all of its officials had arrived for their scheduled Saturday assignments.
Several teams had departed before the ground stop, including all those travelling in the Atlantic Coast Conference, Missouri for a trip to top-ranked Georgia and Duke for a visit to fifth-ranked Miami, while No 10 Texas Tech posted images of its arrival at Oklahoma State. In the NBA, the Cleveland Cavaliers — who played in Miami on Friday night — postponed their return flight until Saturday morning and were scheduled to land about eight hours before their home game against the Dallas Mavericks; coach Kenny Atkinson said: “It’s part of it. You just adapt.” At least two other NBA teams had Friday-night flights pushed to Saturday morning, and Cleveland rebooked hotel rooms in Miami after checking out earlier on Friday.
The NHL had 14 games scheduled for Saturday, with the Florida Panthers among the majority of teams that reached destinations before the stoppage and the San Jose Sharks arriving in Utah late on Friday. In women’s college basketball, JuJu Watkins and third-ranked Southern California were attempting to reach South Carolina for Sunday’s matchup against top-ranked South Carolina after the Trojans had just boarded at Los Angeles International Airport when the ground stop was issued; passengers were told to disembark and the team returned to the Galen Center.
The disruption extended to soccer: the Utah Royals were already in Washington ahead of Saturday’s National Women’s Soccer League semi-final against the Washington Spirit, while the Kansas City Current were scheduled to depart on Friday for their semi-final against Gotham FC in New York on Sunday and team officials were uncertain when their flight would be cleared. The US men’s national team match against Haiti in Miami was unaffected, with both teams and match officials already arrived for the first leg of the two-match Concacaf Nations League quarter-final.