Many college football head coaches and school athletic directors have been asked what it would take to get the 2020 college football season started on time. Northwestern’s Pat Fitzgerald was the latest to be met with that question.

Fitzgerald said that having six weeks to prepare for the season would “give us a chance” to get started on time.

“You go back to the mid 90s when I played — I mean I think it took Coach [Gary] Barnett and his staff somewhere around six weeks to get us in shape,” Fitzgerald said on SiriusXM Radio. “I think we’re going to have to tweak the way we go about things but, you know, just depending on when they tell us or give us a mindset on when we’re gonna go green light, I think six weeks is a minimum.

“From the opening week going backwards, I think you need at least six weeks. Obviously, we’d love to take more. But I think a minimum of six weeks gives us a chance.”

Six weeks is a bit of a shorter timeline than what others have stated. Penn State Athletic Director Sandy Barbour said last week that she believes getting players back on campus 60 days before the start of the college football season would be the target to have kickoff dates unaffected. She and other athletic directors have spoken with sports scientists on the matter, and that 60-day window from the first game minimizes the risk of injury.

That 60-day timeframe would have kids back on campus between July 1 and July 7, depending on the date of their first game. Fitzgerald’s six-week timeline would have student-athletes back on campus between July 18-25.

It’s not a huge difference, but it would be an additional 17 days of cushion if the college football season was still hoping to start the 2020 season on time.

Below is the full clip of Fitzgerald’s response, as posted by SiriusXM on Twitter: