The 2026 college football season kicks off on Thursday in the SEC, with the Missouri Tigers hosting Arkansas-Pine Bluff.
Obviously, that game shouldn’t matter much in the grand scheme of things, but the SEC at large has a very important year ahead of it. Facing a 3-year national title drought in which it has been completely shut out of the College Football Playoff National Championship Game, the SEC desperately needs to quiet some doubters.
However, when ESPN put together its season predictions, only 2 analysts — Heather Dinich and Jake Trotter — picked an SEC team to lift the trophy this year.
Dinich and Trotter both picked the Texas Longhorns and coach Steve Sarkisian to win it all this postseason. Here’s what Dinich had to say:
Heather Dinich: Texas. Nobody in the country has a more complete team in terms of roster and staff, and when your quarterback isn’t the best player on the team — and he’s still a Heisman contender — you should be playing for it all.
Texas opens the 2026 season with a home game against Texas State. Things get real starting in Week 2, when preseason No. 1 Ohio State visits Austin.
Texas was the preseason No. 1 team last year and failed to reach the Playoff. We’ll see if the Longhorns can prove Dinich and Trotter right this time around.
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Adam is a daily fantasy sports (DFS) and sports betting expert. A 2012 graduate of the University of Missouri, Adam now covers all 16 SEC football teams. He is the director of DFS, evergreen and newsletter content across all Saturday Football brands.
