The July developments of conference-only schedule announcements from the Big Ten and Pac-12 worried many and was described by some as a domino falling toward the cancelation of the 2020 college football season. Urban Meyer, however, saw the developments as positives.

The former Florida and Ohio State head coach was recently interviewed on Fox News’ “Bill Hemmer Reports.” During the interview, he cited the conference-only announcements as the reason his optimism has recently increased.

“Two weeks ago, yes,” Meyer said. “Last week, medium. I’m back to yes. We’re going to play. We’re going to play. I’ve just got so much confidence the way these universities are handling this right now. I love the fact that we went conference-only, because they can have control over the protocol, and start-stop dates, etc. I’m optimistic right now.

“What really changed for me is the conference-only games.”

Meyer clarified that while he expects a college football season, it may not be a normal season.

“I didn’t say every conference is going to play. I didn’t say every team is going to play. I said we’re going to play college football. I really believe that conferences, presidents, ADs, and the commissioner(s) are going to work together with the head coaches, and they’re going to work this thing out,” Meyer said. “I just have a lot of confidence in our scientists — the team doctors – I really do. I’ve talked to a few of my colleagues that I’m really close with and I really believe we’re going to get that done.”

As a FOX Sports analyst with an extensive coaching tree (Dan Mullen, Ryan Day, Tom Herman, etc), Meyer remains one of the most well-connected people in college football even as a retired coach. His optimism will be well-received by many fans.

[H/T The Spun]