The Samford Bulldogs football team has released its 2020-2021 schedule. For the first time in recent history, the season will begin in the spring semester.
Samford is one of nine teams in the Southern Conference. The SoCon is one of the few Division I conferences that elected not to play in the fall. After months of discussion, a spring schedule was finally agreed upon.
The Bulldogs will begin their season on Feb. 20 in Johnson City, Tennessee, against Eastern Tennessee State. The team’s first home game will be against Western Carolina the following Saturday.
It will be an eight game schedule concluding with Mercer on April 17. The home games will be against Western Carolina (Feb. 27), Wofford (March 13), VMI (March 20), and Mercer (April 17).
This will be head coach Chris Hatcher’s sixth season leading the Bulldogs. He has an overall record of 32-26 as Samford’s head coach.
The Bulldogs will be returning from a 5-7 season in 2019. This was the first time the Bulldogs won less than six games since 2009. Much of their offensive troubles stemmed from the quarterback position, as Chris Oladokun and Liam Welch engaged in a season-long quarterback battle.
The Samford defense allowed a staggering 38 points per game to opposing offenses last season. The hope is that the extended offseason will give coaches time to fix critical defensive errors that led the Bulldogs to the 5-7 record.
The Samford Men’s and Women’s basketball teams have also released their 2020 schedules.
The Men’s team will begin on Nov. 29 against Alabama A&M and the Women’s team will begin on Nov. 28 against Auburn.
Both teams are beginning their season roughly three weeks later than last season did. On Sept. 14, Athletic Director Martin Newton told Samford Sports’ Jon McAfoos that he wanted to begin the season soon after Samford released students for winter break. It appears that this plan was agreed upon by a majority of SoCon Athletic Directors.
The Men’s Basketball team hired Bucky McMillan in April to lead the program as head coach. McMillan led Mountain Brook High School’s program to seven state finals in his twelve years with the school.
“Bucky has a proven track record of winning championships, a tireless work ethic, a unique basketball mind and the energy and enthusiasm to bring championship basketball to Lakeshore Drive,” A.D. Newton said in an interview with Samford Sports.
The Women’s basketball team will be in its second year under the direction of Karley Kuhns. Kuhns led her Bulldogs to a SoCon regular season and conference championship in her first season.
The Bulldogs will be out for revenge after COVID-19 robbed the team of its trip to the 2020 NCAA Tournament.
More information on Samford Athletics, including rosters, schedules, and COVID-19 updates will continue to be posted on www.samfordsports.com.
