Sun Belt Season Grades: East
Sun Belt Season Grade: A
This would’ve been an A+ if Coastal Carolina was able to get past Liberty in the Cure Bowl overtime thriller. It was the dream season for the conference with a 3-0 record against the Big 12, Coastal Carolina becoming a national thing, Louisiana only losing to the Chanticleers, and Appalachian State, Georgia State, and Georgia Southern were all strong.
Yeah, ULM didn’t win a game, Arkansas State was a massive disappointment, and Troy was just okay, but South Alabama and Texas State were competitive despite their records.
Two Sun Belt teams finished ranked in the top 15. It was all good.
2019 Final Grade: B
Appalachian State 2020 Season Grade: B
2020 Record: 9-3
CFN 2020 Preseason Ranking: 62
CFN 2020 Final Rankings: 68
2019 Final Grade: A
The Mountaineers didn’t win the Sun Belt Championship – they weren’t even among the two best teams in the conference. They won the bowl game over an overmatched North Texas, and there weren’t any bad wins, but the bar has been set a championship high for this program.
Coastal Carolina 2020 Season Grade: A+
2020 Record: 11-1
CFN 2020 Preseason Ranking: 120
CFN 2020 Final Rankings: 12
2019 Final Grade: B-
Welcome to our 2020 Team We Were The Most Wrong About, and it wasn’t even close. The Chanticleers became a national thing, beat BYU, won the Sun Belt title – at least, technically, half of one – and went to overtime against Liberty in the best bowl game of the post-season.
Georgia Southern 2020 Season Grade: B
2020 Record: 8-5
CFN 2020 Preseason Ranking: 84
CFN 2020 Final Rankings: 78
2019 Final Grade: B
The Eagles got to a bowl game – blowing out Louisiana Tech 38-3 – and finished with a solid eight-win season, but it lost to rival Georgia State and couldn’t beat the Sun Belt’s stars. There isn’t a bad loss among the five and all of them were in close fights.
Georgia State 2020 Season Grade: B
2020 Record: 6-4
CFN 2020 Preseason Ranking: 114
CFN 2020 Final Rankings: 77
2019 Final Grade: B+
The only thing keeping the grade from being higher was a 59-52 loss to a mediocre Arkansas State team. The 51-0 drop-kicking from Coastal Carolina didn’t help, but the Panthers beat rival Georgia Southern on the way to closing out with three straight wins including a dominant bowl victory over WKU.
Troy 2020 Season Grade: B-
2020 Record: 5-6
CFN 2020 Preseason Ranking: 105
CFN 2020 Final Rankings: 84
2019 Final Grade: C-
It was a good year, but it could’ve been a whole lot stronger. The blowout win over Arkansas State on the road was good, pushing Coastal Carolina in a 42-38 loss was nice, but four of the losses were by a touchdown or less.
2020 Team Season Grades
ACC | American | Big Ten East | West
Big 12 | C-USA East | West
Independents | MAC East | West
Mountain West | Pac-12 North | South
SEC East | West | Sun Belt East | West