Boise State assistant coach Zac Alley on Tuesday revealed he has tested positive for the coronavirus.
Alley is, to our knowledge, the first college football coach to publicly acknowledge a COVID-19 diagnosis.
Alley, Boise's outside linebackers coach and co-special teams coordinator, said he tested positive about a week ago. Alley says he spent one day in the hospital but is now symptom free.
“I had no symptoms, no anything, and in about a 24-hour period I went from 0 to 100,” Alley told the Idaho Press. “I just had some sharp pains in my chest and all that. It got to a point that night where I was pretty short of breath and couldn’t breathe, and thankfully my girlfriend was like ‘we’re going to the ER’. When we got there they were saying thank God you came in."
Alley said he experienced sharp pain in his chest and shortness of breath, one of the most common COVID-19 symptoms. He said his girlfriend insisted he pursue medical treatment.
Alley said he and his girlfriend had self-isolated for eight days, and the only place he'd ventured out was the grocery store. Alley theorizes he contracted the virus from a shopping cart, but he'll never know for sure.
From the Press:
“As a young healthy person I didn’t think it would affect me as drastically as it did,” Alley said. “I mean my health deteriorated so fast and really I didn’t show any traditional symptoms of what they were saying other than the shortness of breath."
Alley is heading into his second season at Boise State. He spent the previous eight years as an undergraduate and graduate assistant at Clemson.