The NFL officially released the complete 2020-21 schedule on Thursday night, so while the Las Vegas Raiders already knew who they will be playing, they now know when those games will take place.
The Raiders had arguably the most difficult schedule in all of football last season, going almost two months without playing a home game at one point.
While that led to a rough 7-9 season in which they missed the playoffs, it did help build up toughness among the organization’s young players.
Because of that, Raiders head coach Jon Gruden is confident that his team will be ready to play any team in 2020, via the Raiders’ official Twitter account:
“We have three of the last four games at home, if we can take care of business and stay in contention and be a factor in December, to have three home games in Las Vegas is really exciting. But like I said, you know me too well, I don’t want to talk too much about Week 14, 15 and 16, we’ll play anybody, anywhere, on any timezone. That’s the mentality I want us to have, and I know that’s the mentality we’re gonna have.”
The Raiders won’t be facing a gauntlet of a schedule like they did in 2019, but they still have some difficult games in front of them.
They have four Primetime games on the schedule, all of which will come at home. The first will be in Week 2 against a tough New Orleans Saints team in what will be the opening of SoFi Stadium.
Perhaps the most important part of the schedule is Week 9-11 when the Raiders face all three of the other teams in their division in a row. If Las Vegas wants to improve on the 7-9 record from 2019 then beating division opponents will be extremely important.
Gruden is well-aware of that though and certainly will have his team motivated each and every week in 2020.
