Tag: 2020 College Football Playoffs

College Football Playoff to move forward, Heisman Trust unsure

The College Football Playoff committee has released their schedule for the upcoming season. The Heisman Trust hasn’t announced plan.

As the college football season approaches, all eyes were on the College Football Playoff committee. It was announced on Monday that the committee will move forward with the playoff, even without the Big Ten and Pac-12 conferences. It was an expected decision, going forward with three of the Power Five conferences still in play for the upcoming season.

As fans are aware, six conferences have announced their intention to play, and so the selection committee has established its meeting schedule in order to be prepared,” CFP executive director Bill Hancock said at the time. “We will continue to monitor the situation and if anything changes, the committee will be ready to adjust as needed.

The interesting part is that the committee has not made any plans for a spring version of the playoff according to reports. At this time it doesn’t appear that there will be a spring championship but this is a fluid situation and it could change at any time.

Key College Football Playoff dates

  • November 17, 2020- initial rankings released
  • November 24, 2020- rankings released
  • December 1, 2020- rankings released
  • December 8, 2020- rankings released
  • December 15, 2020- final rankings released prior to selection day
  • December 20, 2020- Selection Sunday
  • January 1, 2020- College Football Playoff Semifinals Games
  • January 11, 2020- National Championship Game

Related: Texas viewed as a College Football Playoffs sleeper

While the CFP committee is moving forward with the playoffs, the same cannot be said about the Heisman Trust. Well, at least not yet. According to Dennis Dodd of CBS Sports, the group hasn’t decided if there will indeed be a Heisman Trophy awarded in the 2020-21 college football season.

The annual Heisman Memorial Trophy ceremony is a huge event. Quarterback Sam Ehlinger is looking at his final shot at the award, so this will be a situation to monitor. If they do move forward, Ehlinger will be looking to bring the trophy back to Austin for the first time since Ricky Williams won it. Both Vince Young and Colt McCoy game close to winning the trophy. Can the Austin native bring it home? That remains to be seen.

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College Football Playoff committee releases 2020-21 schedule

The College Football Playoff committee released their final 2020-21 schedule. They also made a change to teams traveling to playoff sites.

The 2020 college football schedule has been one in question for the better part of the last month or so. Speculation ran rampant in terms of playing nonconference games as part of a full schedule or keeping it conference only. On Wednesday the College Football Playoff committee released the schedule for the upcoming season.

The College Football Playoff (CFP) selection committee will release its final rankings of the 2020-21 season Sunday, December 20, executive director Bill Hancock announced. The top four teams will participate in the Playoff Semifinals Friday, January 1, in the Rose Bowl Game and Sugar Bowl. The national championship game will be played Monday, January 11, at Hard Rock Stadium in Miami Gardens, Fla.

The final rankings were originally scheduled to be released Sunday, December 6. The CFP Management Committee made the change as a result of several conferences having moved their championship games to December 12, 18 or 19.

The committee’s final meeting of the season will be December 18-19-20 in Grapevine, Texas.  The CFP will announce the full schedule of this fall’s selection committee meetings at a later date.

Executive Director of the College Football Playoff committee Bill Hancock released a statement in regards to the pandemic. Teams will do the game week prep on campus rather than the travel site in years past.

“In this unprecedented time, the Management Committee believes it is in the best interest for the health and safety of the student-athletes, coaches and staffs to complete their game-week preparation on campus, under the familiar protocols they will have used all season,” said Hancock. “This is an unfortunate consequence of the pandemic, but it is the right thing to do.”

247Sports names the Longhorns as tier four title contenders

Recently 247Sports laid out the title contenders for 2020. Each team put into tiers with Texas being among those in tier four.

Heading into the 2019 season, expectations were high for Tom Herman and company. The team was coming off an impressive victory over the Georgia Bulldogs in the Allstate Sugar Bowl. It was the first full season with then junior quarterback Sam Ehlinger at the helm but it ended in disappointment. The Longhorns faced off against their bitter rivals in the Big 12 Championship but failed to return in 2019.

The first road block in their season was a loss at home to the eventual National Champions. Even after starting out 2-0 in conference play and 4-1 overall, the lost to their hated rivals, the Sooners. They played an inferior team in Kansas and narrowly escaped. Then lost three of their final five games to close out the season. Not the season anyone expected after winning a New Years Six bowl to finish 2018.

Prior to their Valero Alamo Bowl matchup with the Utah Utes, the coordinators were dismissed. The staff was essentially wiped out following the season. Fast forward to June, there is a bit of excitement with a new offense and defense set to take the field for summer workouts. Expectations are that a better season in 2020 should be on the horizon.

The expectations should be compete for a conference championship and hopefully get an invite to the College Football Playoff. The Sooners have been the only Big 12 team to represent the conference and many Longhorns fans, players and media alike would love to see the burnt orange get their shot. In order to do that they will need to dethrone their enemy to the north.

According to 247Sports who recently put all the title contenders into tiers, they have work to do in order to get there.

Texas and Texas A&M both have an on-paper shot this year. They’re among the most experienced teams in the country with senior quarterbacks leading way.

Texas’ issue is a deeper-than-normal Big 12 and a lack of scheme continuity following an offseason of coaching staff changes. A lot must come together early for the Longhorns with a schedule that’s somewhat frontloaded. Trips to LSU and Kansas State come within the first month followed quickly by a clash with Oklahoma.

The Longhorns have a tough stretch but it isn’t an impossible task. To make a run at a title, they will need to beat teams such as Oklahoma, Clemson, Alabama or Ohio State. Those are the teams in the top two tiers. Running through the first five games unscathed will give them the confidence that they can make that deep run into December.

Texas was listed in tier four with the Aggies, Michigan Wolverines and Auburn Tigers.

  • Tier One: Alabama, Ohio State and Clemson
  • Tier 1.5: Georgia
  • Tier Two: Oklahoma
  • Tier Three:Florida, LSU, Notre Dame and Penn State
  • Tier Four; Texas, Texas A&M, Michigan and Auburn
  • Tier Five: Oregon, USC and Washington
  • Tier Six: Oklahoma State, Minnesota and Wisconsin