SEC Begins the 2020 College Football Season Safely

• The SEC begins its 2020 football season safely after looking like it might not happen.
• The Alabama Crimson Tide are expected to win the 2020 SEC Championship
• LSU lost key playmakers to the NFL, but the first part of their schedule looks ‘easy’

Think of those first three weeks of college football as the appetizer, and there were some tasty dishes indeed, but now, in week four, comes the main course, with the SEC finally rolling out its limited yet potentially thrilling season that some experts thought would never happen.

And with LSU stripped of many of the key playmakers that helped make them champions last season, all eyes shift over to Alabama, a team that after ‘only’ posting 11 wins in 2019 are expected to come back with a vengeance in 2020.

Any football is better than no football, and it looks like college football fans are going to get at least a truncated version of the sport they love, and all these talented young athletes will get a chance to play and for the best of them, showcase their skills to the hungry NFL.

SEC Begins the 2020 College Football Season Safely

Nobody who loves the sport of college football was certain that the SEC would even play any games during this pandemically challenged 2020 season, and then last month, the powers that be of the SEC made the decision to officially delay the start until the end of September.

Now, starting this weekend, there will be an SEC schedule that includes a ten conference-only game season that will culminate in the SEC Championship Game on December 19, which means that the whole season will have to take place in a 12-week span, not an easy task given all the moving parts and the threat of COVID-19 always looming.

Four head coaches will begin their first seasons in the SEC during this unprecedented format — Eli Drinkwitz (Missouri), Mike Leach (Mississippi State), Lane Kiffin (Ole Miss) and Sam Pittman (Arkansas), all forced to learn the ropes while keeping their student-athletes safe from injury and the virus.

According to this recent Tweet, to get this season done safely, the SEC will “utilize cutting-edge wearable proximity devices, produced by global technology leader KINEXON, to enhance COVID-19 contact tracing efforts during the 2020 football season.”

NEWS | The @SEC will utilize cutting-edge wearable proximity devices, produced by global technology leader KINEXON, to enhance COVID-19 contact tracing efforts during the 2020 football season.https://t.co/cGmW4LeJsh

— Southeastern Conference (@SEC) September 22, 2020

Alabama Predicted to Win the 2020 SEC Championship

Nobody could believe that the Alabama Crimson Tide could have such a ‘horrible’ 2019 season with ‘only’ 11 wins to their name and no appearance in the College Football Playoffs, which tells you how high the bar has been set by that stellar football program over the years.

The main reason for their excellent reputation, at least for almost the last decade and a half, is head coach Nick Saban, the Crimson Tide ultimate leader who has been at the helm of that university’s eye-popping football program for fourteen glorious seasons now.

Six national championships, eight SEC championships, and two Walter Camp Coach of the Year Awards are all Saban, and that is most likely why Alabama received the most votes for winning the 2020 SEC Championship, snagging 77 first-place votes compared with the next two teams on the list, Georgia and LSU, who each got just 7 first-place votes.

The Twitter account of Alabama Football was one of the first to share the news:

?☠️ https://t.co/DPhfQOJMPp

— Alabama Football (@AlabamaFTBL) September 23, 2020

‘Stripped’ LSU Begins 2020 Schedule on Easy Street

Anyone who watched the 2019 LSU Tigers march straight to the 2020 College Football National Championship and crush Clemson 42-25 understands the level of talent that team possessed, with many of those athletes plucked from the roster by the NFL during the most recent draft.

QB Joe Burrow, LBs K’Lavon Chaisson and Patrick Queen, WR Justin Jefferson, and RB Clyde Edwards-Helaire were all first-round selections, plus there were nine other LSU Tigers taken lower in the draft, making it the heaviest LSU draft ever.

Thankfully LSU does recruit well, and they have plenty of young talent ready to take over, including one of the best defensive players returning, sophomore CB Derek Stingley, but they will not be fully tested due to a relatively ‘easy’ early schedule, their first three games of this shortened season being against Mississippi State, at Vanderbilt and then at home against Missouri.