ATHENS — Intercollegiate athletics at Ohio University’s Eastern campus in St. Clairsville are no more.

Ohio University spokeswoman Carly Leatherwood confirmed the news late Wednesday that OUE and the four other branch campuses are dropping sports, effective for the upcoming fall semester.

OUE held a meeting Tuesday morning about the decision and informed the student-athletes shortly thereafter. OUE sponsored men’s and women’s basketball, volleyball and golf. It also had cross country for a short period of time.

Finances throughout Ohio University have been an issue since the outset of COVID-19 in March, which forced the university to close its buildings and shift to a remote learning model.

However, Leatherwood pointed out that though money was a factor, there had been discussions prior to that of shifting away from the Ohio Regional Campus Conference, which has existed since 1978.

“The pandemic accelerated these discussions as we, unfortunately, do not have the resources to be able to implement the safeguards that are required for safe, competitive sports on our regional campuses this fall,” Leatherwood said.

Along with OUE, other campuses affected by this move are Chillicothe, Lancaster, Southern and Zanesville.

Though these schools won’t feature ‘varsity’ athletics any longer, Leatherwood believes that “club or intramural” sports could occur eventually.

“We continue to believe that the opportunity to engage in healthy, physical activity is extremely important to many of our students, and so we plan to resume athletic programming once it is safe for us to do so,” Leatherwood said.

Jay Morris — who has worked at OUE for 30 years — became the men’s basketball coach in 1992-93 and held the position for 13 years. He guided the Panthers to one conference title in 2001.

“I think we had 23 teams in our league when I started and many of those teams were good,” Morris recalled of the ORCC. “The best part of coaching at OUE was the relationships you build with the players. I am still friends with many of those guys today. You really can’t put a price tag on that part (of coaching).

With sports coming to an end at OUE, there have been plenty of rumors surrounding the impending fate of the Health and Physical Education Center, which sits behind OUE’s Shannon Hall.

Leatherwood, however, said, “there is no intent to sell the facility at this time.”

The Health and Physical Education Center, which not only hosted OUE athletics, has also been the home of every OVAC Basketball Championship Game since the event’s inception and also hosts the OVAC All-Star Basketball Games as well as numerous community events, including St. Clairsville High School’s graduation.

The building also served as a public exercise facility, too. Since the pandemic arrived in mid March, the facility has been closed to the general public.

According to Leatherwood, that will continue to be the case.

“We are following the state’s guidance in keeping non-critical facilities closed during the pandemic,” Leatherwood said.