When the Western Athletic Conference split up following a clandestine meeting of a group of breakaway presidents in 1998, a University of Hawaii official was asked what happened to the collegiality?

“There is always collegiality until there is money involved,” the official said.

It would seem the confluence of COVID-19 and the fast-approaching football season have served up a time calling for collegiality if there ever was one in big-time college sports.

But, with COVID-19 impact and regulations widely differing by states, municipalities and campuses, and the sometimes huge amounts of money riding on whether the games are played, collegiality could really be put to the test in the coming months.

Locally, we’re probably days away from knowing if Fordham will follow through on canceling its scheduled Sept. 12 trip to Aloha Stadium and a month from finding out if Arizona and UH will be getting together in Tucson, Aug. 29, two of the Rainbow Warriors’ most at-risk games at this point.

New York-based Fordham is a football-only member of the Patriot League, whose Council of Presidents announced on June 22 guidance for fall competition that mandated, “No Patriot League teams will fly to competitions and, with rare exceptions, regular-season competition will exclude overnight travel.”

UH’s contracts with Football Championship Subdivision teams similar to Fordham have often had a $750,000 cancellation fee unless there is mutual consent or, “it is caused by conditions beyond the party’s control, including but not limited to acts of God, government restrictions, wars, insurrections and/or any other cause beyond reasonable control of the party whose performance is affected.”

But such force majeure clauses can differ widely.

For example, UH’s contract with Arizona carries a $500,000 cancellation fee and gives wide latitude saying, “it is understood and agreed that neither party hereto can foresee the exigencies beyond the control of either party which hereafter may arise by reason of unusual occurrences, acts of God and nature and acts of common enemy and which would make desirable or necessary the cancellation of this agreement …”

Honolulu attorney Jeff Portnoy said, “There is a ton of litigation going on all over the country right now on what the definition is in various force majeure policies dealing with pandemics, viruses, governmental regulation as well as insurance litigation that deals with business interruption.”

But when it comes to sports, “My guess is that despite the language in these contracts and whether a team is coming here or (UH) going there, there is going to be an accommodation that is acknowledging the unique circumstances of the pandemic,” Portnoy said. “I can’t imagine any school trying to hold somebody to a contract.”

UH athletic director David Matlin, not speaking directly to the Fordham or Arizona situations, said, “Obviously, these are unprecedented times. I think there are a lot of ways to solve these as you look at future years, too.”

Matlin said, “There is the contract and then there is the relationship. And, we are all going to have to work with each other in similar situations.”

If that spirit holds up nationwide and football is played, it might be the most remarkable thing to come out of the season.

Reach Ferd Lewis at flewis@staradvertiser.com or 529-4820.