The Latest: Cincinnati increases capacity for AAC title game

The Latest on the effects of the coronavirus outbreak on sports around the world:

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Thanks to a variance granted by state of Ohio, Cincinnati has upped its crowd capacity to 5,831 for Saturday’s American Athletic Conference championship against Tulsa.

Previously, the school said only 1,500 would be allowed at the game because of state limits imposed by COVID-19 concerns. But the state reconsidered and on Tuesday told Cincinnati that it could have more. The number is 17.9% of Nippert Stadium’s usual capacity of 33,000.

The school said it brought the capacity in line with what’s being allowed for Cleveland Browns and Cincinnati Bengals games.

The 8 p.m. EST game pits No. 6 Cincinnati (8-0, 6-0 AAC) against No. 20 Tulsa (6-1, 6-0).

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The National Football League says there were 14 new confirmed positive COVID-19 tests among players and another 31 positives among other personnel in the league’s latest round of testing.

Screening last week included 16,340 tests administered to 2,389 players and 25,517 tests given to 4,571 personnel.

That brings the totals since the beginning of August through this past Saturday to 187 players and 328 other personnel who’ve tested positive for the disease out of nearly 800,000 tests.

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The first bowl game scheduled to played this season has been canceled.

The Frisco Bowl scheduled for Saturday was called off because SMU is having COVID-19 issues. The Mustangs were scheduled to play Texas-San Antonio in Frisco, Texas.

UTSA will instead play in the First Responder Bowl at Gerald J. Ford Stadium on SMU's campus outside Dallas on Dec. 26 against an opponent to be determined.

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The Indiana-Purdue rivalry game has been canceled again.

Both schools had to pull out of last week’s regularly scheduled battle for the Old Oaken Bucket because of COVID-19 issues. The game was rescheduled as one of the Big Ten’s championship weekend bonus games, but the seventh-ranked Hoosiers and Boilermakers jointly announced that neither team will be able to play Friday.

It will be the first time in-state rivals have not met in a football season since the Spanish flu pandemic forced cancellations in 1918 and ’19.

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