Predicting Florida's 9-game SEC schedule for the 2026 season

After much discussion in recent years, the Southeastern Conference has finally expanded its conference scheduling.

The league announced on Thursday that its 16 member schools will play nine conference games beginning in 2026. The decision puts the SEC in line with the Big Ten and the Big 12, and ends a stretch of multiple years in which the question of eight or nine games surrounded the league, a topic that has been frequently discussed at the annual meetings in Destin.

"Adding a ninth SEC game underscores our universities' commitment to delivering the most competitive football schedule in the nation," SEC commissioner Greg Sankey said in a statement. "This format protects rivalries, increases competitive balance, and paired with our requirement to play an additional Power opponent, ensures SEC teams are well prepared to compete and succeed in the College Football Playoff."

The SEC will use what's been called the 3-6 model for its schedules. The three refers to the three annual opponents that the SEC said will focus on "maintaining many traditional rivalries." The six represents the six other conference games, which will rotate among the remaining schools.

The SEC's release stated that "each team will face every other SEC program at least once every two years and every opponent home and away in four years."

With the focus currently on the upcoming 2025 season, it remains to be seen when the league will announce its 2026 schedules. Until that happens, it's worth speculating who the Florida Gators will face, and I'm taking my best shot at predicting who the Gators will face in 2026, along with where they'll face each opponent. Rather than predicting the date of games, this list is in alphabetical order:

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