Happy Valentine’s Day. Here are 5 reasons why you’ll love the 2020 college football season.
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5. The most interesting college football in 2020 will be played in … Mississippi?
And you thought the end of the 2019 Egg Bowl was a whole lot of fun.
A wild finish with a player pretending to pee like a dog, a missed extra point to miss out on overtime, and one of the most intense games of the season – a 21-20 MSU win – was nothing compared to what’s coming on a weekly basis.
Ole Miss fired head coach Matt Luke, landed Lane Kiffin – an under-appreciated talent as a head man – and away we go.
All aboard the Lane Train.
No one knows how to poke the bear better than Kiffin. He’s going to rally up the base, he’s going to recruit at a high enough level to be a problem, and he’ll get under the skin of the rest of the SEC head coaches.
And he’s going to win a whole lot of games, too.
Mississippi State had a good head coach in Joe Moorhead.
Even though it never got rolling in his two years in Starkville, Moorhead’s offenses are normally amazing, he was just getting his pieces in place, he went to two bowl games in two years, and … he wasn’t Lane Kiffin.
So Mississippi State got the one guy with the type of differentiating factor of an offense to annoy every SEC defensive coordinator.
Granted, LSU and Alabama haven’t had a whole lot of problems lately getting the O going, and it’s not like Leach’s teams have ever done anything all that amazing, but this is different.
Leach has never been a head coach with these resources and this ability to pull in the talent – his 2020 class, which he had almost nothing to do with, was his highest-ranked recruiting haul in 18 years as a head coach.
Leach is going to be Leach, and Mississippi State is going to be Washington State/Texas Tech.
Kiffin is going to be Kiffin, and Ole Miss is going to be a weekly problem to deal with.
And football in Mississippi is about to add even more spice to an already amazing SEC West.
Buuuuuuuut ….
NEXT: No. The most interesting college football in 2020 will be played in … the Big Ten?
4. The most interesting college football in 2020 will be played in … the Big Ten?
The top half of the SEC could beat up the top half of your conference’s dad, but the Big Ten is about to be the most interesting league in college football.
In the end, Ohio State will almost certainly beat Michigan again and be off to the College Football Playoff again, but there are a whole lot of reasons to be fired up if you’re a fan of one of the other 13 teams.
Wisconsin will be dogged a bit after losing Jonathan Taylor, but the defense is going to be the truth.
Michigan is going to be Michigan, Penn State is going to be Penn State, and Iowa is going to be Iowa. Meanwhile, Michigan State has a new direction with a good get in former Colorado head coach Mel Tucker, Rutgers should at least be a step above god-awful under Greg Schiano, and Maryland came up with a good recruiting class under Mike Locksley to give the offense some hope.
Indiana and Illinois are coming off of bowl seasons, Minnesota is coming off of one of its greatest seasons in the history of the program, and Purdue should be stronger with a whole ton of young talent coming off an injury-plagued campaign.
Northwestern is about to balance things out – it’s not going to be as strong as the 2018 run, and it won’t be nearly as miserable as the 2019 version.
And then there’s Nebraska. It’s Year Three under Scott Frost, and other coaches – like Willie Taggart at Florida State – were canned after having the same lack of early success. If this is when it all comes together, then …
Ohio State will still win the Big Ten, but it’ll be a fun ride.
NEXT: The NFL won’t allow Trevor Lawrence and Justin Fields to play in its league for another year
3. The NFL won’t allow Trevor Lawrence and Justin Fields to play in its league for another year
If you had said last year at this exact time that Joe Burrow was going to become so good that he’d be considered the must-have, franchise-changing, No. 1 overall pick, you’d probably think the 2020 NFL Draft class of quarterbacks would be among the all-time best.
It still might be, but there are a whole lot of questions and concerns about Tua Tagovailoa’s health, Justin Herbert’s fire, Jacob Eason’s ability to step up his game, Jordan Love’s potential, and Jake Fromm’s arm.
All that’s just a long-winded way of saying Trevor Lawrence and Justin Fields would be taken in the top five – with Lawrence likely pushing Burrow out of the No. 1 overall spot – if the NFL didn’t have that silly three-years-out-of-high-school eligibility rule.
But for college football fans, the two top-rated recruits in the 2018 class are back, and they’re about to lead the way for what should be the preseason top two teams.
Yeah, we’ve been burned before overhyping superstar prospects, but go ahead and do it with these two – they’re just that good.
Sam Darnold and Josh Rosen were supposed to set the NFL on fire – and they still might – but it’s been a wee bit of a rocky road so far.
Jameis Winston might be trying to find a gig, and Marcus Mariota might be hoping to merely get a shot with someone like Chicago.
Baker Mayfield’s best work has been done in insurance ads, Cam Newton is probably done at Carolina, and Johnny Manziel is now just a phenomenal two-part 30 for 30 coming up some time in the next three-to-five years.
But Lawrence and Fields are different.
They had all the hype coming into college, they both played up to it and then some, and they’re both back for our amusement for one more season – and no, they’re not staying in college for all four years.
The best part about all of this? We know they’re going to be great, but we also know there’s another Joe Burrow out there waiting to be unleashed, which is why …
NEXT: Get ready for a whole lot of new quarterbacks in big places
2. Get ready for a whole lot of new quarterbacks in big places
Last year we had former Ohio State transfer Joe Burrow at LSU, Georgia transfer Justin Fields at Ohio State, Alabama transfer Jalen Hurts about to roll at Oklahoma, former Ole Miss transfer Shea Patterson getting it going at Michigan, former Ohio State Buckeye Tate Martell transferring to Mia …
They didn’t all work out as hoped, but the new transfer rules allowed great quarterbacks to get out and play.
Of course, it would’ve been nice if Hurts was on the Crimson Tide late last year, but his run with the Sooners was special.
This year, there’s … ?
But that’s a good thing. The offseason is going to be full of wild quarterback battles at big places that go right up until the start of the season.
Are you sure Mac Jones is going to be the starter at Alabama, or will super-recruit Bryce Young be ready to go right out of the box?
Is last year’s star get for Oklahoma – Spencer Rattler – ready to be the school’s next Heisman-caliber stat-stuffer?
Who’s going to step up at LSU? How about at Oregon? How about at Michigan?
Is Wake Forest transfer Jamie Newman really going to be the answer at Georgia? Will Feliepe Franks be healed up and ready to take over Arkansas, and will former Houston statical superstar D’Eriq King be the answer for Miami’s new offense?
If you want to get in early on the tech stock, if Stanford QB KJ Costello can stay in one piece, he’s going to be next year’s big shiny early NFL Draft pick after what he’s about to do under Mike Leach at Mississippi State.
And what about the established veterans who are about to emerge as main stage performers?
Can Kyle Trask be the one to lead Florida to the SEC title? Can Kedon Slovis do that again at USC, if the job really is his? Is Bo Nix ready to take a big step up at Auburn? Will Kellen Mond finally turn Texas A&M into a thing under Jimbo Fisher, and will Adrian Martinez ready to make Nebraska good at college football again?
Can Sam Ehlinger lead Texas to the Big 12 title? Can Minnesota’s Tanner Morgan be among the nation’s most efficient passers again? Just how good is Iowa State’s Brock Purdy? What can sophomore sensations Hendon Hooker at Virginia Tech and Jayden Daniels at Arizona State do to be even better?
Can anyone challenge Trevor Lawrence and Justin Fields?
Yeah. And it’s going to be a blast to find out who it’s going to be.
NEXT: This thing is going to be WIDE open
1. The 2020 college football season is going to be WIDE open … to a point
Okay, fine. We already know that the College Football Playoff final four is going to be Clemson, Ohio State, SEC champion, and one team among SEC team with one loss/Oregon/Oklahoma.
Yippee. Let’s just cut to the chase already.
But even though the 2019 CFP was insanely predictable – accounting for the SEC champion being LSU and not Alabama – there was at least a whole lot of hope.
Forgetting for a moment how horrible the games likely would’ve been if any of these upstarts had made it in, Baylor was an overtime against Oklahoma in the Big 12 Championship away from being the cannon fodder for LSU.
Minnesota had a shot at getting to the Big Ten championship with a chance at the CFP had it gotten past Wisconsin in the snow on the final day of the regular season.
Utah was a Pac-12 Championship win away from at least making a case for the fourth spot in the playoff, and Alabama probably would’ve kept out Oklahoma had it not gacked away the Iron Bowl against Auburn.
So while it’s easy to get cynical and assume that the biggest of big boys, who just came up with the biggest of big recruiting classes, will all be in VIPest of sections at the club, remember that last year at this time we were all worried about how boring things would be as Alabama and Clemson ripped through their respective seasons.
Granted, substitute Alabama for LSU, but it was still a wild ride.
Also, last year at this time if you were told that Baylor, Minnesota, and Utah would all be major players in the College Football Playoff chase …
Spring practice began at UConn last week.
