Noon Kicks! Against Oregon State And UNLV
[Patrick Barron]
Michigan has announced that two of their games will actually be at noon this year:
CHICAGO, Ill. -- The University of Michigan football program had a pair of non-conference games selected for noon broadcast nationally, announced today (Friday, June 12) jointly by the networks and the Big Ten Conference. The Wolverines will host Oregon State (Sept. 12) in their home opener and a week later will play UNLV (Sept. 19) in their second of three straight games at Michigan Stadium.
Oregon State is on ABC, UNLV on BTN.
The Michigan noon kick was all but dead. I don't know if this is Hackett, Harbaugh, or random fate, but hooray for a few noon games that allow Michigan fans to see the rest of college football. 3:30 games on the 12th include Iowa-Iowa State and ND-Virginia; on the 19th Nebraska-Miami and Auburn-LSU are at 3:30. A number of other interesting games are likely to join those as the TV people figure out what they want and when.
God IT'S ABOUT FUCKING TIME!!! Even our tomato can BTN games have been 3:30 games in recent years.
That means that I won't have to give up watching a single quality game in place of Michigan football for at least the first three weeks. Hopefully, at least a couple more will follow. Maybe NW, Indiana, Minnesota, or Rutgers.
Actually, this post is about noon start times, not sex.
Yes! This is awesome!
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Might have nothing to do with trying to appease fans, just making the most out of home field advantage. Either way, I love it.
this might just be another one of those small advtanges. Good stuff
Good point. I hated having to watch M00N in place of revelant games as much as anyone (and often pissed off my dad by choosing those over MIchigan), but I'm surprised they picked noon starts for west coast teams.
Wait, you actually choose to watch other teams over Michigan? Even when we sucked, I couldn't possibly imagine doing that.
Yeah. I know I might be in the minority here, but I dont give two shits about what other college games are on. I watch Michigan and Michigan only.
8 games since 2000 in games that started before 1PM. (I did some very light fact checking on this)
It gave you enough time to nap and eat before hitting the bars. 3:30pm games were a marathon where all the food options were swamped, the bars would fill up at 8, etc.
As a 28 year old, I am much less affected.
/random nostalgia
I actually had the opposite experience. I loved 330 starts as a student because I could sleep in a little and have a nice long pregame.
Now adays I hate 330 starts. If I go to the game I don't get back home till late, if I'm watching at home Noon games break up the day better, and if I'm deer hunting 330 starts mean I probably won't be able to get in the woods that night.
Same here. As an alumnus, I now find 3:30 games annoying, the way they seem to take up your entire day. And trying to eat after the game is much harder after 3:30 games.
I was in MMB so I hated the noon games because it meant early morning pre-game rehearsal. Ann Arbor in autumn is really pretty at 8AM, but I don't like being awake at 8AM on a Saturday.
I dunno, I kind of liked the super early morning rehearsal--got it out of the way (because, honestly, if you didn't know shit by then, you weren't going to know it after gameday rehearsal. The whole exercise was a bit pointless 99% of the time...), but with the downside of having about thirty seconds to gulp down some food at the tailgate before visualization started.
The extra positive of the noon start for the MMB was the ability to go home, get some food, take a nap, lounge around, and be ready for the parties that night. 3:30 game? Not as much.
Yeah I hated that rehearsal to pre-game crunch. I think I basically just didn't eat until after 4PM.
Being in HS drama I just understood the rehearsal as a run-through, which OK, but looking back I think it did two things: one, made damn sure everyone was up and ready to go, and two, was more for the staff to inspect the show and make last-minute corrections. It wasn't really for us.
I don't think it's a coincidence that the noon starts are for west coast teams. I bet Harbaugh and/or Hackett made it for the competitive advantage.
All the non-conference games are against west-coast teams this year. Nice that ABC wants Harbaugh's first home game broadcast nationally -- the noon start is the only way to do that. Should draw a large audience, especially if the team somehow gets past Utah in the opener.
I'll go into that one (Utah) with low expectations, but figuring that this team is going to be old enough and experienced enough to maybe just handle it. Thank god it's Utah and Salt Lake City, and not L.A. or something like that. Shouldn't be too hard to keep the team focused.
LOL
Jalen Rose has attributed much of the Utah Jazz' post-season success over the years to the fact that SLC is so boring that it lulls the opponents to sleep.
Traveling there for work, I agree with the sentiment. Of course if you like outdoors activities like fly fishing or biking, it's all there ..but not much of a 'night life' to distract the focused visiting athlete!
That's interesting. I like it.
Noon games are the 5:30 local news of college football.
Yuck.
This is a big deal. I fly up from Florida for a game for each of the kids (5 and 7) and the 3:30 starts suck. When your 5 year old wakes up at 6am and is eager to see the game, trying to find something to do for the next NINE hours is a bit daunting.
With the noon games, you wake up, hit Angelos for breakfast, shop at the M Den, tailgate for 45 minutes, and boom - gametime. Afterwards you can go anywhere you want for dinner or visit local friends.
Of course, the 3:30 games from my outdoor patio TV by the pool in Florida allow me to go off-shore fishing all morning without worrying about missing game time.
First world problems...
humblebrag doc. I award you one upvote.
I'm waiting for Michigan to play an away game in London so I can complain about the food in first class on the flight over. But alas, I'll take noon starts for now...
/s - but only because everyone knows that first class is about the unlimited booze.
I also don't think she realizes there are games on all day. In fact, I don't think many people realize that. You watch Michigan, of course, but also hours upon hours of other games, too. Thankfully I have a wife who understands my obsession with college football. I watch from the start until the finish every Saturday.
I get where Brian is coming from on being able to do something with your night after a noon kickoff but........have noon kickoffs essentially become the ultimate sign of disrespect. It seems only the cruddiest teams get those time slots. I'm not sure I'm rejoicing about having two of these. Even more so considering those are Pacific time zone teams so their fans are watching those games while they're eating their cornflakes. Seems really slap-in-the-facish to me, particularly the Oregon State game.
I for one welcome our new noon kick overlords.
We wait all year for Michigan football.
To me, Michigan games are the highlight of the day, not something to "get out of the way" so that I can do chores / watch other teams / get ready to go out.
That's what laundry is for.
It's not as much about getting it out of the way as letting ourselves do more with that day than wait around for a football game to start. How much longer do I need to stand around drinking in a parking lot when all I want to do is go watch a football game? How great would it be to just get in the car, go home, and watch more football all evening and eat and drink more at home instead of driving back in the dark and knowing my entire Saturday is gone after a 3:30 or night game start?
I disagree, but that's fine. We don't all have to have the same priorities.
I'm not going to neg you just because I have a different opinion.
I'm personally very pleased. I would probably watch the games anyway on TV. However, with a noon start, I will definitely be able to get to at least one of them. I can drive in to Ann Arbor Friday evening, have dinner, enjoy Saturday morning, watch the game, have an early dinner on campus, and be back in the Chicago area by 9pm or so. In mid-September, it also is a great time for a drive.
I'm a little bit nonplussed by the idea in the thread that a noon start is a sign of disrespect. I really think that a mix of noon and 3:30pm games, with a couple or three evening games sprinkled in, couldn't be better. It means there are different choices available for everyone!
for using "nonplussed." It's my second favorite word after, "penultimate."
for having teed up the opportunity to use your favorite word in its proper context in your post and then not doing so.
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I sure hope there isn't the immediate focus on the lacking of the student section at noon. But alas, I'm sure there will be.
We'll get to see with our own eyes how much of a Harbaugh effect there is on student turnout.
This is great news...I didn't expect Oregon State to be a noon game at all, that one screamed 3:30 to me. UNLV makes more sense. Either way...looking forward to having the bulk of my afternoon/evening free for more football. And beer. And grilling.
When do we get our first ESPN game where I get to hear Beth Mowins say, "JAYKE ROO-DOCK" over and over?
I prefer the Noon starts as a TV viewer in the Mountain time zone and the 3:30pm kick-offs for games we go back to. Nothing beats an 8-hour tailgate on the golf course, followed by the game and then back to the ranch for the Saturday Night games on TV.
Noon kicks kill the tailgate
From what I've seen, people have equally valid reasons for liking either start time, so I suppose it's all the same to me.
Noon should be Michigan's time slot. Let it be known throught the land, great football starts at noon and we the showcase. Let all the other teams fight for attention the rest of the day!
]\/[ Go Blue!
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