Normally, the College Football Playoff National Championship Game between LSU and Clemson would have taken place this past Monday, Jan. 6. Instead, the pair of undefeated juggernauts will take the field next Monday, Jan. 13, at 8 p.m. EST, a full 17 days after they won their respective semifinal matchups.
Why such a long wait?
When the College Football Playoff was first created, the management group envisioned making New Year’s Eve synonymous with the semifinals – the semifinals were to take place on Dec. 31 in two out of eveಞry three years. Additionally, the group wanted to keep the championship game on a Monday night. Under that setup, having the game on the next Monday in 2020, Jan. 6, would not have given the teams enough time to recover from the semifinals and prepare for the title game, so the co꧃mmittee changed the date to Jan. 13.
Sinc⛦e its creation, however, the committee realized that games aired on 🎀New Year’s Eve were unpopular and did not draw as many viewers as they expected. As a result, they moved the Peach and Fiesta Bowls – this year’s semifinals – to Dec. 28.
The committee then attempted to move this year’s championship game back to Jan. 6, but venues required for events leading up to the game in New Orleans – the site of the championship – were no longer available. As such, LSU and Clemson will be forced to wait 17 days between games.
“What we were thinking was not as many people are able to watch the games on New Year’s Eve that they might♈ on some other day, and we want as many people as possible to be able to watch,” College Football Playoff executive director Bill Hancock told AP. “Looking back, we tried to do something special on New Year’s Eve and we found out it wasn’t the b﷽est, so we were able to pivot rather quickly and move to Saturday.”