Inventory 'drying up' for appealing college football kickoff games

Auburn photo by Todd Van Emst / Auburn running back Boobie Whitlow fights for yardage during the 2018 Chick-fil-A Kickoff Game in Atlanta, where the No. 9 Tigers prevailed 21-16 over No. 6 Washington. College football kickoff games are becoming tougher to schedule as more top teams compile home-and-home series.
Auburn photo by Todd Van Emst / Auburn running back Boobie Whitlow fights for yardage during the 2018 Chick-fil-A Kickoff Game in Atlanta, where the No. 9 Tigers prevailed 21-16 over No. 6 Washington. College football kickoff games are becoming tougher to schedule as more top teams compile home-and-home series.

When top-ranked Alabama takes the field next Saturday afternoon in Atlanta against No. 14 Miami, it will mark the Crimson Tide's seventh appearance in the Chick-fil-A Kickoff Game.

For those keeping score, that's four times in the since-imploded Georgia Dome and a looming third season-opening trip to Mercedes-Benz Stadium.

That's a tally that Gary Stokan, the CEO of the Chick-fil-A Peach Bowl, can be proud of should he so choose. Yet Stokan can't help but notice the distant home-and-home series being scheduled in college football, including Alabama's games against Florida State and Wisconsin in 2025, Florida State and West Virginia in 2026, Ohio State and West Virginia in 2027, Ohio State and Oklahoma State in 2028, and Notre Dame and Oklahoma State in 2029.

"That's drying up inventory for kickoff games," Stokan said. "In the future, it's going to be tougher and tougher to do these games."

A generation after the Kickoff Classic near New York City and the Pigskin Classic near Los Angeles had their runs as must-see opening matchups, the Chick-fil-A Kickoff Game has been the dominant opener since 2008, when Alabama shellacked Clemson 34-10 to ignite Nick Saban's run in Tuscaloosa that contains six national championships.

The 2017 Chick-fil-A Kickoff showdown had No. 1 Alabama dumping No. 3 Florida State 24-7, and the 2018 pairing had a top-10 billing as well when No. 9 Auburn rallied past No. 6 Washington 21-16. The 2019 game was expected to be a mismatch and was, with No. 2 Alabama routing Duke 42-3, and last year's Chick-fil-A schedule offered a trio of contests in an eight-day stretch - Florida State-West Virginia, Georgia-Virginia and Auburn-North Carolina - that had to be scrapped due to the coronavirus pandemic.

Stokan has lined up a Georgia-Oregon battle for next season and Georgia-Clemson for 2024, but Kirby Smart's Bulldogs have home-and-home series with UCLA in 2025-26 and Florida State in 2027-28 in addition to their season-ending rivalry with Georgia Tech.

"It's tougher and tougher to do it, but we've done it through 2025, so we're in good shape," said Stokan, who announced last month that Tennessee and Syracuse would be part of the 2025 Chick-fil-A Kickoff menu. "ADs are scheduling more intersectional nonconference games with big teams primarily because they want to keep a relevancy to their season ticket base. People are tired of sitting in 100-degree temperatures in a game that's 50-0 at halftime. They don't want to go to those games anymore, and I think ADs are scheduling these games to keep their season ticket base whole and keep that revenue coming in.

"The ADs also believe there is also going to be expansion to the playoff, so if you lose a tough nonconference game and lose a conference game, you could potentially get an at-large bid in a 12-team playoff."

Both Alabama and Georgia indeed have home schedules this season that are lacking compared to most years. The Bulldogs have a home slate consisting of the University of Alabama at Birmingham, South Carolina, Arkansas, Kentucky, Missouri and Charleston Southern, with none of those opponents having won more than five regular-season games last year.

The same stat can be applied to Alabama, which is hosting Mercer, Southern Miss, Ole Miss, Tennessee, LSU, New Mexico State and Arkansas, though LSU's 5-5 record came on the heels of Ed Orgeron's Tigers winning the 2019 national championship.

With Alabama and Georgia opting for more home-and-home series, Stokan has other Southeastern Conference programs to pair against Atlantic Coast Conference members in a formula that succeeded annually in the Peach Bowl before it became a New Year's Six destination. Even that could be more difficult, however, with the ACC's recent scheduling alliance with the Big Ten and Pac-12 conferences.

An SEC team has been featured in the Chick-fil-A Kickoff marquee matchup every year, while an ACC member has been part of the featured game with just three exceptions: Boise State's win over Georgia in 2011, Alabama's win over West Virginia in 2014, and Auburn-Washington in 2018.

Dallas, Houston and Charlotte, North Carolina, have followed Atlanta's lead with kickoff games, but Houston's matchup this year is Houston versus Texas Tech, while Dallas had to buy a game that originally had Kansas State hosting Stanford.

"We've built something that is meaningful in college football, and that's what we wanted to do," Stokan said. "We don't have a problem with any of the SEC teams. For starters, they're all good football teams, and they all have a huge alumni base in Atlanta.

"It's easy to get to Atlanta, so the SEC works, and I could say the same thing about the ACC."

Contact David Paschall at dpaschall@timesfreepress.com or 423-757-6524. Follow him on Twitter @DavidSPaschall.

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