ESPN gave ‘strong consideration’ to bringing College GameDay

[AfricanMustang]

UNIVERSITY PARK – It was announced late on Saturday night that the famed and popular College GameDay show on ESPN would go to Penn State next weekend to highlight the Michigan-PSU game.

The network typically chooses the biggest game, or a game of significant intrigue. And SMU administrators had been lobbying throughout Saturday afternoon for the show to come to University Park.

The Dallas Morning News reached out to ESPN on Sunday to see if it had given any consideration to bringing the show to SMU.

“SMU’s success has certainly caught the attention of College GameDay this season,” a network spokesman responded, “and we gave strong consideration to bringing the show to campus this weekend for the game vs. Temple.”

The network also stated that it would have an SMU feature on the College GameDay telecast on Saturday. The show airs from 9 a.m. to 11 a.m. CT on Saturday.

SMU athletic director Rick Hart, as well as Dallas mayor Eric Johnson tweeted in support of SMU hosting College GameDay, before the final decision was announced, College GameDay is aired every Saturday during the college football season. The backdrop is typically hundreds of rowdy fans, many of them will hold signs for the nation to see.

Given the ESPN statement to the DMN, and the location where the network inevitably decided to go, the decision to go to Penn State was directly correlated to PSU’s Saturday night win at Iowa. Had the Hawkeyes won, SMU probably would have hosted the show.

https://www.dallasnews.com/sports/colle ... ay-to-smu/

[ObeyMyDog]

Makes sense. The AZ St and Utah game has just as much of an argument as us in terms of quality of matchup. We would've been a great story and (obviously I'm biased) now seemed like the perfect time to do it with 6-0.... but I also get it.

That being said - Big 10 football is brutal to watch.

[leopold]

Keep winning.

They’ll come.

[Charleston Pony]

GameDay likes to have a large and vocal crowd behind the stage so Penn State clearly trumps SMU and Michigan is one of the most storied programs in college football so hard to argue about ESPN's decision. They will also have the "life after Jo Pa" story line. Will be interesting to see if they get into the abuse scandal or just gloss over that. You know they would have been ready with a re-telling of the death penalty at SMU because that's something ONLY SMU will ever experience.

Just keep winning and our day will come.

[Junior]

Life after the death penalty is a better story than life after child rapists/molesters. Just sayin’.

[sbsmith]

ESPN gave ‘strong consideration’ to bringing College GameDay

I wonder if any of our remaining games gets "strong consideration" for College Gameday

Nov 2 @ Memphis- Competition (10 Georgia vs 9 Florida)
Nov 9 vs ECU- Competition (2 LSU @ 1 Alabama)
Nov 23 @ Navy- Competition (7 Penn State @ 4 Ohio State)
Nov 30 vs Tulane- Competition (1 Alabama @ 11 Auburn, 4 Ohio State @ 16 Michigan)

[Mexmustang]

He sent them a Tweet? What a strong gesture! Does he not have a phone?

[Mustangs_Maroons]

ESPN gave ‘strong consideration’ to bringing College GameDay

I wonder if any of our remaining games gets "strong consideration" for College Gameday

Nov 2 @ Memphis- Competition (10 Georgia vs 9 Florida)
Nov 9 vs ECU- Competition (2 LSU @ 1 Alabama)
Nov 23 @ Navy- Competition (7 Penn State @ 4 Ohio State)
Nov 30 vs Tulane- Competition (1 Alabama @ 11 Auburn, 4 Ohio State @ 16 Michigan)

Oct 26 is also an option, but you have ND/Michigan, Wisconsin/Ohio State, Auburn/LSU.

At face value, all these games generate more national publicity, but there is also the element that they won't go to the same stadium again, so on Nov 2, I don't think they will go to Florida again, so I see these as the most likely date, but then again it's not at SMU. The whole purpose is to talk up SMU, and you get more impact if the game had been at SMU, vs SMU as the visiting team. There aren't many other top 25 games that week so you never know. Can memphis be re-ranked going into that trip? The LSU/Alabama game is all but booked in my mind.

[HubbaHubba]

The only thing that would make it somewhat fair is if every time they mention p state they preface it with "the first time they have been ranked in the top 7 since the child rape scandal".

[sbsmith]

Oct 26 is also an option, but you have ND/Michigan, Wisconsin/Ohio State, Auburn/LSU.

At face value, all these games generate more national publicity, but there is also the element that they won't go to the same stadium again, so on Nov 2, I don't think they will go to Florida again, so I see these as the most likely date, but then again it's not at SMU.

We don't have a game on Oct 26 (our game @ Houston is on Oct 24). It's not uncommon for Gameday to do repeat stadium visits if the matchup warrants though the Florida-Georgia game wouldn't count as such since it's played in Jacksonville.

[ponyte]

The fact we were in the conversation is a huge advance for the program. But face it, ESPN can't let a chance to give publicity to Pedophile State pass. Got to rehabilitate Near God(less) Joe, don't you know.

[leopold]

ESPN gave ‘strong consideration’ to bringing College GameDay

I wonder if any of our remaining games gets "strong consideration" for College Gameday

Nov 2 @ Memphis- Competition (10 Georgia vs 9 Florida)
Nov 9 vs ECU- Competition (2 LSU @ 1 Alabama)
Nov 23 @ Navy- Competition (7 Penn State @ 4 Ohio State)
Nov 30 vs Tulane- Competition (1 Alabama @ 11 Auburn, 4 Ohio State @ 16 Michigan)

Could see it happening with us undefeated going to a 1 loss Memphis team - truth be told I was pulling for Memphis against Temple for just that reason. But both Memphis an us have a tough game this weekend - Memphis has Tulane at home.

Could see it happening at the end of the season as well, if both SMU and Tulane win out, but of course that's a long way out. Auburn and Michigan are both going to lose again, so some of the luster of those games will be gone. The sheer novelty of a 11-0 SMU and 10-1 Tulane, both ranked, could be interesting.

Hope springs eternal in College Football.

[SMU_Alum11]

If us and Tulane win out to the last game, I could see Gameday coming and that might get us the fan attention to keep attendance up on a historically horrible attended game.

[SMUstang07]

This is good and all but of course they'll say this. Were they going to say "hell no we weren't considering your game!!"

[well travelled pony]

Life after the death penalty is a better story than life after child rapists/molesters. Just sayin’.

+1

Go Ponies!