The Florida Gators will open the 2020 season on the road in Oxford, Mississippi. That was announced Monday afternoon and now we know the rest of the Florida Gators’ 2020 football schedule.
Florida’s schedule
Sep. 26 — At Ole Miss
Oct. 3 — South Carolina
Oct. 10 — At Texas A&M
Oct. 17 — LSU
Oct. 24 — Missouri
Oct. 31 — BYE
Nov. 7 — Georgia (In Jacksonville)
Nov. 14 — Arkansas
Nov. 21 — at Vanderbilt
Nov. 28 — Kentucky
Dec 5. — at Tennessee
Florida’s matchup with Arkansas will be the first meeting between the schools since 2016. Arkansas gave Florida more than they could handle that afternoon to the tune of a 31-10 beating. This year’s matchup gains intrigue due to the fact that former Florida quarterback Feleipe Franks is expected to be the starting quarterback for the Razorbacks.
Franks’ season ended prematurely with a broken leg in 2019. Kyle Trask took over in the fourth quarter against Kentucky, leading a comeback win and helped Florida to 11 wins, and an Orange Bowl victory. This will be Franks’ homecoming in Gainesville and a chance to get a win over his former team. While that storyline might excite fans and media, Dan Mullen didn’t sound thrilled at the prospect of playing his former player.
“It will be a unique deal, obviously not ideal, to me. I don’t think for him or us, I don’t know, we’ll see. I mean, I think obviously I have great respect for Feleipe as a person. I think he’s a tremendous young man, I’m so happy for what he did for our program here, how he handled himself. He was always a first-class person, and I was really excited for him to get this whole, new fresh start for one more year of college – kind of a re-do,” Mullen said Monday. “Having to play them this year kind of brings up things that, I don’t know how good that is for anybody. But it’ll be unique. I know he will be motivated to play us. I’m sure our guys probably will be motivated to play him because it’s a little more personal, you know him. I don’t know if that’s a great thing or not.”
This will be the first time the Gators have opened a season against an SEC opponent since 1992. That year Florida opened the season with a 35-19 win over Kentucky on the way to a 9-4 season and a Gator Bowl win over N.C. State.
Another interesting matchup for Florida is their October 10th trip to Kyle Field to play Texas A&M. For one, it will be Florida’s first trip to Kyle Field since 2012 when Johnny Manziel was making his first collegiate start and had yet to become Johnny Football. It will also be the first time Kyle Trask gets to play back in his home state and another chance for Florida to play against Jimbo Fisher, who spent 2010-2017 as the head coach at Florida State.
The SEC Championship is scheduled for Saturday, December 19th. All 14 SEC teams share an open date on December 12th that can be used to make up any games that may have been postponed for whatever reason during the course of the season.