BleedGopher
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per FoxSports:
Q: Where and when are this year's playoff games?
A: This year's semifinals rotate to the Orange and Cotton Bowls and will be played Dec. 31 at 4 and 8 p.m. ET. Organizers will decide which game gets which time slot when the teams are determined.
The championship game again takes place on a Monday night, Jan. 11, in Glendale, Ariz.
Q: Wait ... did you just say the semifinals are on New Year's Eve?
A: Yep. Under the 12-year contract that began last season, the semis will take place on Dec. 31 instead of Jan. 1 two out of every three years.
Q: Why??
A: Well, back in the summer of 2012, while details of the playoff were still being negotiated, the Big Ten and Pac-12 made a separate deal with ESPN assuring the Rose Bowl its traditional 5 p.m. New Year's Day time slot. Not to be outdone, the Big 12 and SEC locked down the Jan. 1 primetime window for a new matchup they wound up selling to the Sugar Bowl. So playoff organizers -- which included the commissioners of those same conferences -- had to work around those existing deals when ESPN won the playoff rights.
Q: Does the Rose Bowl go back to its usual Big Ten-Pac-12 matchup?
Yes. Even if both conferences' champs make the playoff, the league's next highest-ranked teams will automatically go to Pasadena. Ditto the Sugar Bowl with the SEC and Big 12. And since the ACC's contract bowl, the Orange, is a semifinal site this year, its champ is guaranteed one of the open spots in the Peach or Fiesta if it doesn't finish in the Top 4.
http://www.foxsports.com/college-fo...ttee-orange-bowl-cotton-bowl-jeff-long-082415
Go Gophers!!
Q: Where and when are this year's playoff games?
A: This year's semifinals rotate to the Orange and Cotton Bowls and will be played Dec. 31 at 4 and 8 p.m. ET. Organizers will decide which game gets which time slot when the teams are determined.
The championship game again takes place on a Monday night, Jan. 11, in Glendale, Ariz.
Q: Wait ... did you just say the semifinals are on New Year's Eve?
A: Yep. Under the 12-year contract that began last season, the semis will take place on Dec. 31 instead of Jan. 1 two out of every three years.
Q: Why??
A: Well, back in the summer of 2012, while details of the playoff were still being negotiated, the Big Ten and Pac-12 made a separate deal with ESPN assuring the Rose Bowl its traditional 5 p.m. New Year's Day time slot. Not to be outdone, the Big 12 and SEC locked down the Jan. 1 primetime window for a new matchup they wound up selling to the Sugar Bowl. So playoff organizers -- which included the commissioners of those same conferences -- had to work around those existing deals when ESPN won the playoff rights.
Q: Does the Rose Bowl go back to its usual Big Ten-Pac-12 matchup?
Yes. Even if both conferences' champs make the playoff, the league's next highest-ranked teams will automatically go to Pasadena. Ditto the Sugar Bowl with the SEC and Big 12. And since the ACC's contract bowl, the Orange, is a semifinal site this year, its champ is guaranteed one of the open spots in the Peach or Fiesta if it doesn't finish in the Top 4.
http://www.foxsports.com/college-fo...ttee-orange-bowl-cotton-bowl-jeff-long-082415
Go Gophers!!