Florida athletics director Scott Stricklin tested positive for coronavirus last month but has since recovered, he said Tuesday.
During a Zoom teleconference with reporters, Stricklin said he had mild symptoms that ranged from a runny nose, headache, congestion and chills. After he first felt sick, he immediately got tested for coronavirus and when the test came back positive, he quarantined for 10 days from the onset of symptoms.
Stricklin said he had 48 hours where he felt "really crummy" and then another three or four days that "I didn't feel like going out and running a marathon. After that, I felt like I was back to normal."
"I thought I was being careful but obviously this is a highly transmittable disease," Stricklin said, adding he was initially mad that he put himself in that situation. "It speaks to the importance of all us doing our part with masking and physical distancing. It's really important. Hopefully, we can help keep others safe during this process by doing our part."
Stricklin also updated the current coronavirus testing numbers among student-athletes on campus for voluntary workouts. As of this weekend, 238 tests had been done on athletes across all sports, with 29 positive test results. When athletes initially returned to campus, Florida did 188 tests with three positive results. The 26 positives came from 50 additional tests conducted after athletes showed symptoms or there was suspicion to test.
All of this speaks to the difficulty in trying to predict when and if any sports season can take place without a vaccine. SEC athletics directors met in Birmingham, Alabama, on Monday to discuss a wide range of topics, including scheduling. The Big Ten and Pac-12 have already announced a move to conference-only schedules.
But Stricklin said scheduling is secondary to trying to establish testing and safety protocols, which they are still in the process of doing.
"I know everybody's worried about a schedule, and we're driven by this artificial timeline of saying Labor Day weekend we're all going to kick off because that's what we've always done, but until we figure out some of these other pieces, it's really hard to make an educated guess on what that other part looks like," Stricklin said. "Right now, there's no way of really knowing."
Stricklin was also asked about the possibility of the season moving to the spring.
"There's still a lot of information that we need before we get to the point where we feel we can conduct a game in a safe manner," Stricklin said. "If that's September, great. If that's a different month in the calendar that allows us to do it in this school year, I don't think any of us are in position to be choosy right now."