More than two months after one major Division II conference in California suspended sports competition for the remainder of the year, the Pacific West Conference succumbed to the coronavirus pandemic as well.

That includes Point Loma Nazarene, which intends to bring back students to campus for in-person classes starting Aug. 17 and had proposed a truncated fall sports season to its fellow conference members.

Instead, presidents from the 11 PacWest schools voted to postpone all fall sports — men’s and women’s soccer, men’s and women’s cross country, and women’s volleyball — until after Jan. 1. They hope to provide clarity about basketball, which typically starts practice Oct. 15 and games in November, by Oct. 1.

“It’s disappointment that we’ve had to come to this decision as a conference,” said Point Loma Nazarene Athletic Director Ethan Hamilton. “We’ll assess and develop plans and schedules to compete as soon as the conference will allow. We’re working on answering as many questions as we can for student-athletes, trying to keep them engaged.

“There is a minority of students we’ve talked to who have some concerns, and I completely understand that. But I also think there’s a large group that was excited and eager to get back. One thing that we continue to evaluate is to make sure not only do they have good physical health but also that they’re mentally healthy.”

The California Collegiate Athletic Association, a Div. II conference of 12 CSU campuses, did the same on May 12, just hours after CSU Chancellor Timothy White announced that the system would predominantly go online for fall semester.

The PacWest held out, and in recent weeks Hamilton and other ADs had formulated a plan for an abbreviated fall schedule to reduce travel by playing teams in your geographical region, then continue the balance of the season in 2021. The PacWest has four members in Southern California, four in Fresno or the Bay Area, and three in Hawaii.

The NCAA Div. II office was on board, allowing that if the full season couldn’t be completed, student-athletes wouldn’t burn a year of eligibility by playing a half-dozen games in the fall.

Then Azusa Pacific announced Wednesday it is going fully online for fall semester and won’t play sports until 2021 at the earliest. By Friday, the rest of the conference rejected proposals to resume sports in October or November and will wait until 2021 as well.

“This was a very difficult, but well-thought-out decision and one that so many individuals worked together on over the past several weeks,” PacWest Commissioner Bob Hogue said.

Unlike the CCAA, which suspended all sports activities for the fall semester, the PacWest did not rule out fall practices.

“Institutions will still be allowed to conduct organized team activities at their own discretion,” the conference release states, “including workouts, practices, strength and conditioning, and access to their athletic training staff, as local, county, and state guidelines permit.”