Iowa football: Black Friday game for Hawks, Huskers?
The University of Iowa has made it clear it believes that college football is played on Saturday.
Nebraska, on the other hand, has a tradition now entering its 21st season. The Huskers have played their final regular-season game the day after Thanksgiving since 1990.
The Huskers first hosted Oklahoma from 1990 to 1995, and then when the Big 8 expanded to the Big 12, hosted Colorado.
Now Iowa is the final game on Nebraska’s schedule, so will the Hawkeyes and the Huskers tangle on Black Friday?
“I’m just trying to catch my breath on the divisions and getting the schedules,” Iowa athletics director Gary Barta said Thursday. “I haven’t even thought about it. It’s one of those bridges I’m not ready to cross yet.”
According to the schedules the Big Ten released on Wednesday, Iowa travels to Nebraska on Nov. 26 in 2011, and the Huskers come to Kinnick Stadium on Nov. 24 in 2012.
“I think Nebraska will do whatever they’re told right now,” said Omaha World-Herald writer Tom Shatel. “They don’t have any right to come in and make any demands.
But I knew we’ve gotten several e-mails (since Wednesday) asking if the Big Ten will let us have our Friday game.”
While Iowa knows the chaos of trying to play on a weekday night in their current location would be significant, a lot of those issues might come up the Friday after Thanksgiving, a University of Iowa holiday day.
“Obviously the University of Iowa Hospitals and Clinics are still up and running, so we’d have to sit down and chat about that,” said Paula Jantz, Iowa’s associate athletes director in charge of operations and event management. “We’d have to talk with all the folks on campus to see if that’s even an open for us.”
Iowa could make it work, but will they be asked to? Nebraska media relations director Keith Mann directed that question to the Big Ten office.
Shatel said the Friday tradition was originally about the Oklahoma rival and ensuring the game got on national television.
In this new TV age, a Friday Big Ten game that weekend makes a lot of sense. Big Ten teams don’t play night games in November, and the final Saturday schedule is already stacked with Michigan-Ohio State and Wisconsin-Penn State.
“The Iowa series is so good, so much fun, even if it’s Saturday, fans won’t care,” Shatel said. “But Iowa-Nebraska, a backyard feud … it’d be fun to play on Friday. Why not separate it and put it on its own stage? I’d be in favor of it.”
With the 2010 seasons for Nebraska and Iowa set to start today, it is likely a discussion that will be put off until at least the calendar turns to 2011.
“I’m not going to deal in hypotheticals at this point,” Barta said. “We have Eastern Illinois (tomorrow). That’s my focus now.”
Category: Iowa Hawkeyes Football
