Countdown to Kickoff: Likely-Case Scenarios for the 2020 Season

Benjamin Tankersley

As much as I would love to say that Georgia Tech will have everything figured out next week, that just isn’t going to happen. We will likely see some improvement, but I don’t expect Tech to win any titles this year. I think this season will start similar to last with some shuffling at quarterback, but I think they will settle on one after a few games. As for the season, I think they’ll finish right around .500, but whether it’s above or below that is anyone’s guess.

Chris Paschal

We play a few games and then the season gets cancelled. If we get to play our first four games I think 2-2 is probably a reasonable expectation for a team that still needs to prove itself, but I could also see us punching up at 3-1 if things fall the right way. As far as only getting to play four games, everything I’ve seen seems to be pointing towards a stunted season. Cases at schools are exploding, major dominos have already fallen, and I don’t see how schools would be able to justify both sending students home and keeping athletes on campus to play.

Jake Grant

A comfy 6-5 miasma. Syracuse, Pitt, BC, NC State, Miami, and one of Duke or UCF. Nothing too crazy. Nothing too bad. Bordering on Gaileyesque.

Jeffrey Cramer

Georgia Tech was expected to finish around the same win total as last year even if they saw improvement in some key areas on the team. A lot of that had to do with one of the most daunting schedules in college football. Now Tech has lost some of its tougher competition in favor of teams that it can better compete with this year. A realistic expectation should be around 5 to 6 wins this year. If the Yellow Jackets truly are improving they need to take wins against Syracuse, Boston College, Duke, and NC State. Each of these teams have multiple positions they need to work on or have little experience. Then we should try to steal one or two from the group of FSU, Pitt, and Miami. FSU as the opener could put Tech in a favorable spot as the Seminoles take the field for the first time under a new coaching staff. A win from any of the remaining teams would be a bonus and would show this group is really starting to come into their own. I’ll predict a final record of 6-5 with wins over FSU, Syracuse, Boston College, Pitt, Duke, and NC State.

Leviticus Warner

I believe we will take a step in the right direction. Six wins is an attainable goal and I’ll explain how we get there. I look at our 11 game schedule and see two automatic losses to Clemson and Notre Dame. They are playoff contenders and just too dang good. I also see a couple automatic wins, we really did luck out in the ACC schedule lottery. We added some beatable teams and lost a couple auto losses. I think we can easily beat BC, Syracuse, and NC State.

Everyone else is a toss-up. That’s FSU (new coach), UCF (a group of 5 school), Louisville, Pitt, and Duke (all suffering down years), Miami (struggling with identity as well). I say we go .500 over the toss ups and finish six wins and become bowl eligible in a year without bowls. That would be significant progress for CGC.

Robert Binion

4-7 — We do some shuffling at quarterback. The running game is above average, while the passing game still struggles to find its footing. The defense is improved but not good enough to compensate for the weakness of the offense. The kicking game is the same as last year.

We beat NCSU, Syracuse, BC, and Duke. Fans are understanding but frustrated, and there should be a change or two on the staff.

Akshay Easwaran

This season isn’t .500 or bust (while my inner fan wants it to be, my brain tells me that might be next year) — like I mentioned yesterday, the goal is to show material progress. 4-6 wins (boring, I know) seems like the sweet spot here, especially with a significantly easier schedule than both last year and the original 2020 slate. If we only get three wins but all of our losses are close, I’ll take that too (as painful as that would feel). It’s all about growth and progression.

Carter Templeton

I’d like to think last year reset everyone’s expectations for this year..... and then this year happened and threw those reset expectations in a blender. At its core, though, things are still the same — progress year over year compared to last year, and progress from September to November.

It’s nice to look at the revised 2020 schedule and see that several of the tougher opponents have been dropped from it. The thing is, most of what remains and what was rotated in elicits a big “welllll, I don’t know.” Outside of Clemson and Notre Dame, there’s no game I feel fairly confident in the result of. (Maybe Cuse and NC State. Again, I don’t know.) If this staff scrapes five wins from that, chalk it up as a W for the season, especially if there aren’t any 40+ point blowouts. Six wins or more would be stellar. But right now, I wouldn’t buy it.

All this, of course, assumes we’ll get a full season in. With things going the way they are at Tech and other schools, it’s not looking good.