CHIP72
June 7th, 2024, 10:48 AM
I didn't see any threads or posts about the announcement made yesterday, but the Celebration Bowl, aka the DI-AA/FCS HBCU national championship game, is being moved one week earlier in the season, from the 3rd Saturday in December to the 2nd Saturday in December in 2024 (specific date, December 14th). The change is likely related to the expansion of the DI-A/FBS playoffs, which will start the weekend of December 21st & 22nd. The Celebration Bowl's start time (12 PM ET) is not changing and it will still be televised on ABC.
The net results of this change are:
*The Celebration Bowl will take place the same day as the Army-Navy Game (which starts at 3 PM ET).
*The Celebration Bowl will take place the same weekend as the DI-AA/FCS quarterfinals (4 games) rather than the DI-AA/FCS semifinals (2 games).
The latter issue may impact the scheduling and TV/streaming network broadcasting of the quarterfinal playoff games, with another DI-AA/FCS game added to the schedule. Having said that, in 2023 the four quarterfinal playoff games were played on Friday night, Saturday at 12 PM ET (ESPN), Saturday at 2:30 PM ET (ABC), and Saturday at 10 PM ET (ESPN+). The 2024 quarterfinal playoff game time schedule would not need to be adjusted much to accommodate the Celebration Bowl while keeping the quarterfinal time/broadcast network designations the same as in 2023. The primary difference is the early Saturday afternoon DI-AA/FCS quarterfinal game would share the timeslot with the Celebration Bowl.
I suspect the 2024 quarterfinal games will have similar start times as in 2023 with the exception that the 2:30 PM ET game on ABC will move to 3:30 PM ET (and probably still on ABC so the network would have a college football doubleheader, both involving DI-AA/FCS games).
One other note - one DI-A/FBS bowl game, the Camellia Bowl, is also moving to the 2nd Saturday in December. It will be played at 9 PM ET that day and televised on ESPN. If the last DI-AA/FCS quarterfinal (Saturday night) game is shown on broadcast TV this year, it would need to be televised on ESPN2 or ESPNU. (That would still be an improvement over 2023 when that game was only streamed on ESPN+.)
The net results of this change are:
*The Celebration Bowl will take place the same day as the Army-Navy Game (which starts at 3 PM ET).
*The Celebration Bowl will take place the same weekend as the DI-AA/FCS quarterfinals (4 games) rather than the DI-AA/FCS semifinals (2 games).
The latter issue may impact the scheduling and TV/streaming network broadcasting of the quarterfinal playoff games, with another DI-AA/FCS game added to the schedule. Having said that, in 2023 the four quarterfinal playoff games were played on Friday night, Saturday at 12 PM ET (ESPN), Saturday at 2:30 PM ET (ABC), and Saturday at 10 PM ET (ESPN+). The 2024 quarterfinal playoff game time schedule would not need to be adjusted much to accommodate the Celebration Bowl while keeping the quarterfinal time/broadcast network designations the same as in 2023. The primary difference is the early Saturday afternoon DI-AA/FCS quarterfinal game would share the timeslot with the Celebration Bowl.
I suspect the 2024 quarterfinal games will have similar start times as in 2023 with the exception that the 2:30 PM ET game on ABC will move to 3:30 PM ET (and probably still on ABC so the network would have a college football doubleheader, both involving DI-AA/FCS games).
One other note - one DI-A/FBS bowl game, the Camellia Bowl, is also moving to the 2nd Saturday in December. It will be played at 9 PM ET that day and televised on ESPN. If the last DI-AA/FCS quarterfinal (Saturday night) game is shown on broadcast TV this year, it would need to be televised on ESPN2 or ESPNU. (That would still be an improvement over 2023 when that game was only streamed on ESPN+.)