Today CBS released a portion of their 2015 SEC Football schedule, and it seems the good times of 2014 LSU football at night were not meant to last. Like, at all.
Sept. 5 |
Louisville vs. Auburn |
3:30 PM |
Sept. 12 |
Georgia at Vanderbilt |
3:30 PM |
Sept. 19 |
Auburn at LSU |
3:30 PM |
Oct. 31 |
Florida vs. Georgia |
3:30 PM |
Nov. 7 |
SEC Doubleheader |
3:30 PM 8:00 PM |
Nov. 14 |
SEC Doubleheader |
12:00 NOON 3:30 PM |
Nov. 27 |
Missouri at Arkansas |
2:30 PM |
Dec. 5 |
SEC Championship |
4:00 PM |
The first thing to note is that someone at CBS Sports finally got their head out of their ass and realized that skipping the first few weeks of the college football season to air golf and tennis was a bad idea. CBS will be right there on opening weekend with Louisville vs. Auburn, the other kickoff weekend game in ATL.
Enough with delaying the painful news. Auburn @ LSU, one of only 2 decent games on the LSU home slate in 2015 and the shining jewel among the painful slog that is LSU's September schedule, has been put in the 2:30 slot on Sept 19th. 2:30pm on a mid September day. Just lovely. For all Alleva's bluster, he has failed yet again when it truly matters. Having all night games in 2014 is not some grand accomplishment that gets to be celebrated. All night games is the STANDARD. It is WHAT'S SUPPOSED TO HAPPEN. Less than that is just a varying degree of failure. And in a September slate that frankly sucks, expect more depressing photos of the half-filled 100K seat barn that Tiger Stadium has become.
Frankly, CBS continues to prove what an albatross around the neck of the SEC TV deal it is. For all the bluster you hear about "National Audience" and "Network TV" CBS's day games get blown out of the water in the ratings by ESPN night games almost every week they go head to head. It's not the 70's or even the 00's anymore. People have cable and know where ESPN is. And as long as CBS continues to force portions of the SEC slate into daytime, SEC football ratings will be depressed because of it. What's worse is that they know this. All of CBS's highest rated SEC games ever come from the night games they run once a year. One day they'll wise up and start airing night games instead of Matlock or whatever nonsense goes on on CBS Saturday nights. Until then, there's only one SEC CBS night game, and yes, this year's is again set for the weekend of LSU-Bama.
There is some non-horrible news in all this. Miz-Ark seems to have it's orbit firmly stuck in the Black Friday 1:30 game. Which means LSU-A&M may be permanently affixed to a Thanksgiving and Saturday rotation based on location. It kinda sucks, because it means I, and many families like mine in Louisiana, will never make a road trip to College Station. Thanksgiving football is an Aggie thing, and I'm glad they get to keep part of their tradition, but it's not something I'm interested in. With any luck, they'll hash it out with Texas in a few years and LSU will get to detach itself from this nonsense.
It would appear we will get a partial schedule release from ESPN later this week as well, so stay tuned.