Pac-12 Conference aiming for Sept. 19 kickoff for football, per report

The revised Pac-12 football schedule will kick off on Sept. 19 and likely will feature 10 games, according to a published report.

Longtime Pac-12 chronicler Jon Wilner of The Mercury News reported some of the proposed details of the conference’s plan, which is expected to be released by the end of next week.

The favored model, per Wilner, features a 10-game schedule in which each team would play the other five schools in its division, plus five crossover games.

The schedule includes “at least two bye weeks,” per the report, “creating windows for games that cannot be played as scheduled” because of the coronavirus pandemic – the impetus for the changes that were announced earlier this month.

The Pac-12 is hopeful that coronavirus cases will wane over the next several weeks. The target date to start training camp is the middle of August.

The Pac-12 Championship Game in Las Vegas would be played sometime in December. The three possibilities, depending on how the season goes, are Dec. 4-5, Dec. 11-12 and Dec. 18-19.

Arizona was to have opened the season Aug. 29 against Hawaii. But that game was canceled, along with a home game against Portland State and a road game against Texas Tech, when the Pac-12 decided to move to an all-conference format to allow for greater scheduling flexibility and streamlined safety protocols.

The original Wildcats schedule had them opening conference play against Stanford on Sept. 12 and visiting Texas Tech on Sept. 19.