All signs point towards a delay in starting a season and a shortened season. The alliance with the SEC, Big 12, and the ACC could result in a 9 game season that features 8 conference games and one game with one of the other two conferences. The SEC already has several games set with the two conferences including Florida-Florida State, Georgia-Georgia Tech, South Carolina-Clemson, LSU-Texas, Kentucky-Louisville, Vanderbilt-Kansas State, Arkansas-Notre Dame, Auburn-North Carolina, Mississippi State-NC State, Ole Miss-Baylor, Tennessee-Oklahoma. Only Alabama, Missouri and Texas A&M don’t already have scheduled games with opponents with the Big 12 or the ACC.
The question is when would the football start. Reports within the PAC-12 say their league is planning on a 10 game conference only schedule starting the weekend of Sept. 19th.
In speaking with some in the SEC this week, there is confidence that there will be football this fall. When it will start and who gets to watch it are two different questions.
The NFL has greatly reduced their number of attendees this season with most franchises saying less than 20k fans. What capacity could college football stadiums have? No one knows for sure but it feels like it will be smaller than anyone was thinking a month ago.
The financial burden if there is a season with little to no fans would be heavy as the college model centers around attendance. For Tennessee that burden would be magnified by the fact that in the plus-1 schedule model there would only be 4 home games, which would leave the question of how would the athletic department make up for the financial shortfall. There could be furloughs and pay cuts. There’s also a small department reserve. Then there is the University reserve that could be used. There’s a reason all athletic department contracts are signed by the University.