GREENSBORO, N.C. — The bands kept playing Thursday morning at the Atlantic Coast Conference Tournament, but the teams never tipped off.

Amid an international outbreak of the COVID-19 coronavirus that has shut down cities and countries, the league came to the decision to cancel the ACC Tournament and send teams home early with three days of games still set to be played at the Greensboro Coliseum. Even more devastating for the Louisville men's basketball team was the cancellation of the NCAA Tournament hours later.

The ACC and NCAA made the decision they had to make. Athletics events around the country were called off, and schools, businesses and other venues around the world have been forced to close their doors in the wake of the pandemic.

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Six players – Steven Enoch, Fresh Kimble, Ryan McMahon, Jordan Nwora, Dwayne Sutton and Keith Oddo – are leaving the program this summer. They didn't speak to reporters before leaving Greensboro, but you could see the dejection in their faces as they waited in the Sheraton hotel lobby as it became clearer that this was the end.

McMahon spent five years in Louisville. He was here for the season Louisville self-enforced a postseason ban. He was here when the FBI's investigation into college basketball was revealed and Louisville's coaching staff was completely overhauled. He stuck around through the upheaval and the rebirth of the program under coach Chris Mack.

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Sutton is a Louisville native who was playing with his hometown on his back. Enoch and Nwora could have boosted their NBA stock with strong showings in March Madness. Kimble and Oddo were playing for their last and best shot at a Final Four.

Instead, their college careers ended before they could take the court at the ACC Tournament. They went 24-7 in their final season, one that opened with Final Four aspirations and ended with a gut punch in Greensboro.

Thursday morning was a surreal scene. ACC commissioner John Swofford held a press conference at 10:30 a.m. to announce games would go on as scheduled – fans and nonessential personnel were barred from the arena in a decision made late Wednesday, but the teams had planned to play on with no one in the crowd.

By the time warm-ups were taking place, though, and with Florida State and Clemson’s bands playing in the stands, the players were pulled from the court Thursday morning as other conferences decided to cancel their tournaments. The ACC’s announcement came minutes later, around noon, as Swofford addressed athletes and media members on the court in Greensboro. He gave the trophy to FSU, the league's outright regular-season champion.

Also:2020 SEC Basketball Tournament canceled over coronavirus concerns

From Wednesday:Louisville fans at ACC Tournament hit hard on a surreal night

“It’s tough to say those words to these young men that are on the floor that would be continuing to play. It’s tough to say those words for you fans that are in the stands and the media covering this great event,” the commissioner said. “But we believe it’s the right decision to make at this particular point in time.”

Louisville athletics director Vince Tyra met with reporters in a hastily called media scrum at Greensboro’s Sheraton hotel at 12:45 p.m. The news was moving too fast to provide a lot of clarity, he said – he had another conference call set with ACC presidents and officials at 2 p.m. – but said canceling the tournament was the right move.

“The coaches and players are obviously disappointed, but we’ve got to look out for the safety, health and welfare of the athletes at this tournament as well as the fans and others,” Tyra said, with a number of Louisville coaches and players seated nearby in the lobby. “I think the athletics directors and presidents and chancellors of the universities are all in sync on the decision with commissioner Swofford, and now we’ll await what’s next.”

An avalanche came next. The NCAA Tournament had previously announced it would play on without fans, but blue-blood schools like Duke and Kansas said that afternoon that they were suspending travel for athletics programs amid the pandemic. Tyra said before those announcements that he expected the NCAA Tournament would be played, but “as everyone has said, the word ‘fluid’ fits with the situation.” At 4:18, the NCAA made the annoucement – March Madness would not be played in 2020.

The ACC also announced later in the day that it would suspend all athletics activities, including games, practices, travel and "participation in NCAA championships" until further notice.

Tyra didn’t have all the answers, and nobody did. But Louisville, he said, was continuing to monitor the situation.

The university’s women’s lacrosse team was on its way home from Delaware, Tyra said, after the coronavirus had been found on its campus. Whether spring sports would continue had yet to be determined, and other exhibitions and practices had already be canceled. A full hiatus of the spring sports season, he said, was his expectation. Travel restrictions in regards to recruiting were also expected, he said, as the coronavirus continued to spread.

All of that came true an hour later with the ACC's announcement.

“There’s certainly more cases being found out about, and I think that they’re trending out now where you can see what this is going to project out to be – and there’s some pretty dismal reports and there’s some that show if you take the proper actions like we’re taking right now across the U.S. that we can stalemate it a bit,” Tyra said Thursday afternoon. “But today, it’s growing.”

Lucas Aulbach can be reached at laulbach@courier-journal.com, 502-582-4649 or on Twitter @LucasAulbach. Support strong local journalism and subscribe: www.courier-journal.com/lucasa.