AP photo by Paul Kieu / Coastal Carolina running back CJ Marable, left, and quarterback Grayson McCall celebrate after Marable scored a touchdown on Oct. 14 at Louisiana-Lafayette. Coastal Carolina went on to win 30-27, and the undefeated Chanticleers were set to host the Ragin’ Cajuns in a rematch this weekend before the Sun Belt Conference title game was canceled late Thursday due to COVID-19.Back in August, when there was still doubt about whether any college football games would be played during the COVID-19 pandemic, Big 12 commissioner Bob Bowlsby said he would look at the season as a success if he could hand out a conference championship trophy in December.
The virus is not going to allow for traditional presentations, but Bowlsby and most of his fellow commissioners in the Football Bowl Subdivision will reach that goal this weekend.
That won’t be the case for the Sun Belt after its title game was called off late Thursday due to a positive test for Coastal Carolina, which was to face Louisiana-Lafayette but would have had to do so missing an entire position group due to contact tracing.
Still, no league got in more of its regular season than the Sun Belt. Despite several postponements, only one regular-season conference game out of 40 did not get played as eight of 10 schools played a full eight-game league schedule.
“I think this is a successful season. There’s no question about it,” Sun Belt commissioner Keith Gill said Friday. “We started the season knowing there would be disruption. We’ve kind of played through that disruption.”