The UCF Knights will kick off the 2020-21 season on Sept. 4 against the North Carolina Tar Heels at home and are set to play seven home games and eight conference games this season.
- Sept. 4 vs. UNC
- Sept. 12 vs. FIU
- Sept. 19 at Georgia Tech
- Sept. 24 at ECU
- Oct. 3 vs. Tulsa — Family Weekend
- Oct. 10 — Bye Week
- Oct. 16 at Memphis
- Oct. 24 vs. Tulane — Homecoming
- Oct. 31 at Houston
- Nov. 7 vs. Florida A&M
- Nov. 14 vs. Temple
- Nov. 21 vs. Cincinnati
- Nov. 27 at South Florida
- Dec. 5 — AAC Championship
The home-and-home series with the Tar Heels was set to begin in 2018 with UCF traveling to UNC, but the game was canceled as Hurricane Florence approached the Carolinas.
The first three weekends of kickoff and television times — along with midweek matchup details — will be released by the American Athletic Conference in May, according to a UCF Athletics news release.
UCF ranked No. 24 in the postseason AP Top 25 Poll on Jan. 14, and was ranked the highest Group of Five team in the preseason Football Power Index rankings — landing the No. 21 spot — on Monday.
No. 40 Cincinnati, No. 45 Houston, No. 51 Boise State, No. 57 Memphis and No. 62 BYU are all current or future UCF opponents that ranked in Monday’s preseason FPI rankings.
The 2020-21 season will also mark the beginning of the 12-year media rights extension with ESPN, according to a press release.
“We are excited to announce our 2020 schedule as we enter the next phase of our longstanding relationship with ESPN,” AAC commissioner Mike Aresco said in a Tuesday press release. “ … I have no doubt that we will once again provide our fans, and ESPN, with compelling matchups throughout the season in both conference and nonconference play.”
The new agreement, which was announced in March 2019, will allow the conference to have a more extensive presence on ESPN’s primary TV networks – ABC, ESPN, ESPN2 and ESPNU, the release states.
ESPN’s sports streaming service, ESPN+, will carry more than 11,000 events during the term of the agreement — including football, men’s and women’s basketball and Olympic sports contests — but will only feature 500 events during the 2020-21 season.
In the 2021-22 season, 750 events will be added to ESPN+ and at least 1,000 events will be added to the platform each year during the contract, according to the release.
“As a proud member of The American, this is a big day for UCF,” UCF Director of Athletics Danny White said in a release about the media rights extension. “We feel strongly that our nationally competitive programs, at UCF and throughout the league, have proven that there are six power conferences in college athletics.”
ESPN has been the primary media rights holder for the conference since it began in 2013, according to the release.
