The longest college football season in history will span 149 days from the season openers Aug. 24 to the national championship game Jan. 20. Yet with all that ground covered, there is a gaping hole in the schedule.
Thanksgiving Eve.
It’s the greatest untapped terrain available for the conferences and their media partners, with an audience desperate for football and nothing available — not even the MAC, which plays every Wednesday in November except this Wednesday.
Someone needs to take the plunge and play at 8 p.m. Eastern on Thanksgiving Eve.
Maybe it’s the Big 12, which is seeking creative ways to provide exposure and revenue.
Maybe it’s the rebuilt Pac-12, which is exploring all options as it pursues a new media rights contract.
The territory is wide open as the football-crazed audience waits impatiently for the NFL’s tripleheader on Thanksgiving Day.
“It could be the right opportunity for somebody and a way to separate themselves from other conferences,” said Dave Brown, the former ESPN programming executive whose scheduling service, Gridiron, is used by the majority of FBS schools.
“From a (TV) windows standpoint, that’s correct. The only thing going on the night before Thanksgiving is the NBA (and the NHL).”
Naturally, there are hurdles to playing in the middle of the week on the eve of a major holiday — and 10 days before conference championship games. None of them are deal-breakers, however.
— The campus environment.
Immense resources are required to host football games, regardless of the day of the week. Beyond the issues of stadium volunteers, security teams and parking attendants, schools would need to decide about bookstore hours, tailgating parameters, traffic patterns and more.
Yes, students have scattered for the holiday, but that’s true for home games on the Friday and Saturday after Thanksgiving.
“Only the schools could really give you an idea if they could host the games,” Brown said.
— The required preparation time.
Players need at least four days between games, meaning they cannot play Saturday and then the following Wednesday.
Participants in any Wednesday game would need to play the previous Thursday or Friday, thus disrupting two weeks of competition, or they would need a bye the Saturday before the game.
A late-November bye is easier to build into conference schedules when there are 14 weeks in the regular season, which creates room for two byes.
“This year and next year, there are two byes,” Brown said. “In 2026, there’s only one, but they might have Week 0 games green-lighted by then.”
The NCAA sets the competition calendar and is considering opening up Week 0, the Saturday before Labor Day weekend, for a full lineup of games.
— The conference championship rest issue.
Any team playing on Thanksgiving Eve would have three extra days of rest in the event it advanced to the conference championship game (10 days later). Its opponent, presumably, would have played a normal Saturday-to-Saturday schedule.
There would be no way to know in advance which teams are more likely to play for the title, and flexing teams into the Thanksgiving Eve window is (likely) untenable.
“You might get some pushback” — particularly from coaches — “about giving anybody a bye before the conference championship,” Brown said. “That’s where the rubber could meet the road.”
In a world where Stanford-Wake Forest, Utah-UCF and USC-Rutgers are conference games, university presidents and athletic directors have proven they will accept any inconvenience for the sake of every last dime.
Thanksgiving Eve offers the best, and perhaps only chance to claim new ground on the media landscape. By 8 p.m. ET on Wednesday, the football world is ready. The NFL is dark. The logistics are challenging but surmountable.
Big 12 commissioner Brett Yormark is said to be interested, according to sources.
The rebuilt Pac-12 should do the same.
“If somebody wanted to create a new window,” Brown said, “it could be done.”
— Ohio State’s victory over Indiana last weekend drew 9.3 million viewers on Fox and was the most-watched game of Week 13 on any network, according to Fox.
Oklahoma’s upset of Alabama was the top-rated game on ABC with 7 million viewers.
— The only Pac-12 conference game of the season — Oregon State’s riveting win over Washington State — drew 695,000 viewers on The CW, according to a source.
That’s the largest college football audience of the season for The CW, which also airs ACC games.
— Both major pregame shows aired live from Columbus. Fox’s ‘Big Noon Kickoff’ drew an average of 2.3 million viewers, the most-watched episode of the season, while ESPN’s ‘College GameDay’ attracted 2.5 million viewers.
(‘GameDay’ is averaging 2.2 million viewers per episode and tracking for its best season, according to ESPN.)
— This week, ‘GameDay’ will visit College Station in advance of Texas A&M’s rivalry game with Texas. ‘Big Noon Kickoff’ will be back in Columbus, of course, for the Michigan-Ohio State collision.
The final weekend of the regular season features perhaps the best viewing options of the year. Combine the traditional rivalries with a slew of games carrying College Football Playoff stakes and we struggled to narrow our list to seven.
(All times Pacific)
Michigan at Ohio State (9 a.m. on Fox): The Game typically attracts the largest TV audience of the regular season, but Michigan’s mediocre record could undermine viewership. The pressure is on Buckeyes coach Ryan Day to end a three-game losing streak to the Wolverines. TV crew: Gus Johnson, Joel Klatt and Jenny Taft
South Carolina at Clemson (9 a.m. on ESPN): The game you didn’t know you needed to watch features two playoff contenders. That’s right, the Gamecocks are in the hunt for an at-large berth. TV crew: Roy Philpott, Sam Acho and Taylor Davis
Notre Dame at USC (12:30 p.m. on CBS): One of the greatest rivalries in the sport will be on CBS for the first time since we-can’t-remember-when. The Irish must win to clinch a playoff berth. USC can play the spoiler. TV crew: Brad Nessler, Gary Danielson, and Jenny Dell
Arizona State at Arizona (12:30 p.m. on Fox): An underrated rivalry on the animosity scale is worthy of the Fox platform with Arizona State driving for a berth in the Big 12 championship game. Arizona can (partially) salvage a disappointing season. TV crew: Jason Benetti, Brock Huard and Allison Williams
Washington at Oregon (4:30 p.m. on NBC): The Ducks are on the brink of their first undefeated regular season since 2010. The Huskies have won the past three meetings, all by three points with remarkably similar scores: 37-34, 36-33 and 34-31. (Pro tip: This edition won’t be close.) TV crew: Noah Eagle, Todd Blackledge and Kathryn Tappen
Texas at Texas A&M (4:30 p.m. on ABC): Massive stakes for both teams (SEC championship, CFP bids) as the longtime rivals meet for the first time since 2011. TV crew: Chris Fowler, Kirk Herbstreit and Holly Rowe
Air Force at San Diego State (7:30 p.m. on FS1): Worthy of mention only because it’s the final widely available broadcast of the 2024 regular season. (Hawaii-New Mexico starts at 8 p.m. but is on Spectrum Sports.) TV crew: Evan Lepler and Charles Arbuckle
*** Send suggestions, comments and tips (confidentiality guaranteed) to wilnerhotline@bayareanewsgroup.com or call 408-920-5716
*** Follow me on the social media platform X: @WilnerHotline
