On Sept. 28, 1918, Riley Shue played in his first college football game. It isn’t clear how many college football players died of the flu in fall 1918. Why would universities in 1918 forge ahead with football while a virus decimated the ranks of young, healthy men? The answer is something arguably even bigger than a global pandemic: a global war. The lead-up to that 1918 college football season was similarly chaotic to this year’s, which starts in earnest on Thursday with about half of the nation’s major college teams opting out.

Source: Wall Street Journal September 02, 2020 12:04 UTC