Asked if playing in near-freezing weather at Ohio State might pose a challenge for his team, Tennessee coach Josh Heupel quickly noted that it wouldn't be the Volunteers' first rodeo with the cold.
Kicker Max Gilbert even posted a photo last week standing with teammates as light snow fell before a morning practice. And, Tennessee beat cross-state rival Vanderbilt last month on a tundra of sorts with a kickoff temperature of 41 degrees (5 Celsius) before dropping to the 30s in the fading daylight. A combination of heated benches, portable heaters and extra layers helped take the chill off, along with a 36-23 comeback victory.
The Saturday night forecast calls for temperatures in the high teens and low 20s with a slight chance of snow for the first-round College Football Playoff matchup in Columbus, Ohio. But with few degrees of separation between climates in the Tennessee and Ohio valleys, it won't feel much different when the Vols venture 350 miles north to face the Buckeyes.
''Yeah, it's a June day in South Dakota," Heupel joked this week. "It's going to be great football weather. A couple of weeks ago we played in 30 degree weather. We practice in the morning, still a chill, as cold as it will be around this area. And at the end of the day, you get between the white lines, weather doesn't matter. The temperature doesn't. And we'll be ready to go play. It'll be a lot of fun.''
The playoff this year for the first time is holding first-round games on campus and that opens things up in terms of potential weather. Whether this weekend's official start of winter has a chilling effect on the outcome in the expanded 12-team playoff remains to be seen, but it's a definite departure from warm climates Power Four teams are used to for postseason games.
The prospect of spending the Christmas and New Year's Day holidays preparing for a bowl in a sunny locale is considered an incentivizing finish to a long season.
Warmer destinations and indoor stadiums await the first-round winners in the quarterfinals, but no one's complaining about the chance to play in ''ideal'' football weather that many players grew up with. This additional postseason layer may require, well, layering for players, but cold comes with the territory and is worth the sacrifice of playing for a national championship.
''Whether there's snow or not snow, whether it's really cold or just kind of cold, it is what it is,'' said SMU coach Rhett Lashlee, who noted his players' aspirations of an NFL career certainly can and should include the likelihood of wintry weather.