Getty Image / Elizabeth Conley/ Houston Chronicle
The long-awaited 12-team College Football Playoff rolls out next season which will set up some scheduling conflicts between the NFL and College Football.
For years, the NFL has accommodated College Football scheduling when possible so as not to trample CFB ratings. It is in the NFL’s best interest to have premier CFB games receiving prime TV slots to hype up the next generation of NFL stars. There’s also the Sports Broadcasting Act of 1961 which prohibits NFL games from being broadcast “on Friday nights (after 6 p.m.) and Saturdays from the 2nd Friday in September until the 2nd Saturday in December” if there is a HS or NCAAF game within 75 miles of the broadcasting station.
But with the new 12-team College Football Playoff format there will be conflicts. And NFL chief media and business officer Brian Rolapp told Awful Announcing the NFL will not change anything about how they operate that time of year to accommodate College Football ratings. Saying:
“I’m not sure it changes much what we do, we’ve been in those windows traditionally. I mean, we’ve always just, regardless of the competition, put the strongest games (on), now, it’s not changing. You know, so we can’t control what they do. We’ve had a long history of sort of working with them. But I think they probably see that they have limited windows to play on Saturday, which is their choice, and we were like, we’re still going to do what we do.”
The NFL And College Football Playoffs Will Overlap
In the 12-team College Football Playoff beginning next season, the first game will be played on Friday, 12/20 and three games will be played on Saturday, 12/21. The quarterfinals will be held on Tuesday, 12/31 and Wednesday, 1/1. Semifinal games will be played on Thursday 1/9 and Friday 1/10. Then the College Football National Championship will be held on Monday, January 20th.
There will be conflicts. It remains to be seen how many conflicts there will be but there will definitely be instances of College Football going up against the NFL.