College football fans will be focused on Hendon Hooker this Saturday, mostly because the SEC and national championships will be on the line, but also because the Heisman Trophy race will encounter a new plot point. Tennessee versus Georgia is the main event in the sport.

Let's look at the landscape for Hendon Hooker, the Heisman Trophy front-runner, and his two closest pursuers for the most prestigious individual award in college football.

College football fans know Hendon Hooker leads the Heisman Trophy race, but that could change soon

How soon could the Heisman Trophy race change? This Saturday. Hendon Hooker goes up against the Georgia Bulldogs, the defending national champions of college football, on the road, in Athens. It's an ultimate Heisman-defining moment, for better or worse. It's high-stakes poker. Hooker became the front-runner for the 2022 Heisman Trophy by beating Nick Saban and the Alabama Crimson Tide on national television and scoring 52 points in the process. It's hard to make a better statement than that …

but Hooker has that precise opportunity against Georgia.

If he goes on the road and knocks off the defending champions — and a defense which is widely acknowledged as being better than the Alabama defense Hooker outplayed a few weeks ago — Hooker would become a near-lock to win the award. No one is going to have a better pair of wins than Hooker among top-tier Heisman contenders. They only way he could beat Georgia and not boost his stock is if the game somehow devolves into an ugly mess and the Vols win in spite of Hooker … but the idea that such a scenario will unfold if the Vols win is extremely unlikely. Tennessee beating Georgia centrally depends on Hooker playing well. It's very doubtful the quarterback will struggle in a game the Vols win. It's all there for Hendon Hooker in the Tennessee Georgia game. Tennessee football fans know this.

In terms of other Heisman Trophy candidates on the rise, the two primary challengers to Hooker are waiting to pounce on the opportunity which will emerge if Hooker and Tennessee are drubbed by Georgia and Kirby Smart.

C.J. Stroud of Ohio State is the clear No. 2 in the 2022 Heisman Trophy race. He wasn't spectacular in the first three quarters against Penn State this past weekend, but he was brilliant in the fourth quarter, when the game was on the line. That clutch display solidified his No. 2 spot behind Hooker. Stroud will get his chance to play Michigan on national television in a game which will likely decide a College Football Playoff spot. A Hooker loss to Georgia (with less-than-great statistics) plus a big Stroud performance against Michigan should lift him to the top spot. Ohio State fans probably think that's a likely scenario. Likely or not, it's certainly very realistic.

Other Heisman Trophy contenders include Caleb Williams of USC and Will Anderson of Alabama, but the player with a unique chance to make a statement in November is Max Duggan of TCU. Duggan has TCU unbeaten. If the Horned Frogs keep winning and are able to finish 13-0, Duggan will have a chance if Hooker and Stroud both lose. No one would view him as the favorite for this revered college football award, but he owns more leverage than most non-Hooker, non-Stroud contenders at the moment.