Mark your calendars, SEC fans. The unofficial start of the college football season is heading to the Sunshine State. The SEC has announced that its 2026 Football Kickoff Media Days will be held in Tampa, Florida, from July 20-23, marking the first time the event has ever been hosted in the state.

This move to Tampa's Marriott Water Street and JW Marriott signals a fresh chapter for the conference's premier preseason event, which has previously been anchored in locations like Hoover, Nashville, and Atlanta. It's a fitting shift as Tampa solidifies itself as a major football hub, also set to host the Georgia-Florida game during Jacksonville's stadium renovations and the 2028 College Football Playoff National Championship.

As always, the SEC Network will provide wall-to-wall coverage of the four-day spectacle, where coaches and star players set the narrative for the upcoming season. While the full roster of attending athletes and a detailed TV schedule will be released closer to the event, the conference has unveiled the coach lineup. The schedule, listed alphabetically by school, is as follows:

Monday, July 20: Will Stein (Kentucky), Eliah Drinkwitz (Missouri), Brent Venables (Oklahoma), Josh Heupel (Tennessee).

Tuesday, July 21: Alex Golesh (Auburn), Kirby Smart (Georgia), Shane Beamer (South Carolina), Clark Lea (Vanderbilt).

Get ready for the predictions, the bold statements, and the first glimpse of the storylines that will define the 2026 SEC race. The road to the championship begins in Tampa.