Paul Bunyan Axe to be played on Black Friday.

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GopherVotary said:
I sent a letter to the Big Ten office asking them to run their schedules by me before making anything official. I didn’t get a response yet.
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Keep us posted, but I think that you are barking up the wrong tree. A truthful reply from the conference would be along the lines of "If you want your opinion to matter, you should direct your request to our network partners, they call the shots."
 

I guess I’m in the minority, but I love this! National tv game and if gives me an excuse to take a day of annual leave to stay home and watch us whip that Becky ass!!!
 


I don't hate this, I don't love it either. Makes it incredibly harder to make a short trip to Madison. A 2:00 start would make it a lot better. For me to get to Madison by 10:00 I would need to leave around 5:30 am. Thanksgiving makes it harder to leave the day before.

For home games, it isn't much different for me. Obviously 11:00 games make tailgating slightly less fun, but for the Wisconsin game I am showing up whenever.

I loved our tradition of 2:30 on Saturday vs. Wisconsin, but I'll adjust to this.
 

Complete Article:
www.nytimes.com

Big Ten schedule breakdown: 10 topics from Weeks 1-3 choices to West Coast viewing

“The complexity of this puzzle, it’s unprecedented at our level,” said Big Ten chief operating officer Kerry Kenny.
www.nytimes.com www.nytimes.com

Black Friday shift

Nebraska–Iowa will meet on Black Friday for the 14th consecutive year but will kick off in prime time on NBC for the first time. Wisconsin–Minnesota will join their nearby brethren on the same date but open the day at noon ET on CBS.

“For nostalgic Big Ten fans, the Big Ten West kind of rises again on Black Friday,” Kenny said.

It represents a 180-degree turn for Wisconsin to compete on Black Friday. In 2017, former Nebraska coach Mike Riley and former athletics director Shawn Eichorst wanted to shift the Iowa-Nebraska game from Friday to Saturday, and Iowa objected. The Big Ten then switched season finales beginning in 2020 with Iowa playing Wisconsin and Nebraska facing Minnesota. Then, Nebraska’s hierarchy fired both Riley and Eichorst and petitioned to resume its Black Friday tradition with Iowa. The Hawkeyes wanted to continue playing on Black Friday against Wisconsin, but former Badgers athletics director Barry Alvarez declined to move the game from Saturday. Ultimately, the schedules changed during the COVID season with Iowa-Nebraska returning to Black Friday and it was extended in perpetuity.

With the additional television contracts, schools are granted “tolerances,” which allow them to veto certain requests. For Iowa, it’s playing a Friday night game on a non-holiday weekend because of the hospitals located across the street. Michigan has refused to play on Friday at all, which the conference allows. Wisconsin playing on Black Friday no longer is a non-starter.

“Wisconsin just added a heated playing surface into Camp Randall that obviously from a player health and safety perspective aligns with what the weather could be that time of year to make that at least a better environment for that game,” Kenny said. “But also just trying to capture with broadcast windows, you want to make sure that you’re putting your universities and your programs in the best position to really tell a story and have the opportunity to maybe capture some non-traditional viewers that wouldn’t normally watch that game on a Saturday. It just is a really unique opportunity for the Axe to have a really great stage on a national level.”
 


tweet from Greg Flugaur:

According to
@TheAthletic
the Big Ten conference in the years ahead will have Football games being played on every single Friday during the season. During 2024 only the 3rd and 10th week of the season will have no Friday Big Ten games.

from The Athletic:
The Big Ten will play 15 games on Fridays this fall, avoiding just the third and 10th weekends. Last week, Fox announced nine Friday prime-time kickoffs. Thursday, the league released its pair of Black Friday offerings and four other games appearing on FS1 and BTN.

As complex as the scheduling matrix can be, the Big Ten aided its road Friday competitors with a travel reprieve. None of the road teams travel the week prior, so the short week schedule won’t drastically impact their teams. In addition, all three non-West Coast teams flying to the Pacific time zone are off the following week.

In upcoming years, the Big Ten plans to play on every Friday of the season.

in other B1G scheduling notes:

*On Oct. 26 following Game 1 of the World Series, Rutgers and USC will kick off at the Memorial Coliseum at 11 p.m. Eastern.

*If any program pulled the short competitive straw, it was Michigan State. In a span of six days, the Spartans host Ohio State on Sept. 28 then travel to Oregon on a Friday. Both the Buckeyes and Ducks are likely to begin the season ranked in the top five.
 


FireDaveLee said:
“Wisconsin just added a heated playing surface into Camp Randall that obviously from a player health and safety perspective aligns with what the weather could be that time of year to make that at least a better environment for that game,” Kenny said.
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How is this at all relevant to playing on Black Friday??? The alternative is literally playing the next day....
 

Tickets ordered. We’ve won the Axe two of the three times I’ve been to Camp Randall. Looking to make it three for four.
 



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