Report: 2024 date changed, TV designation, game time leaked for Georgia, Georgia Tech
Hours ahead of the SEC’s planned schedule release for dozens of games in the 2024 football season, news has leaked about one game time change in the Georgia–Georgia Tech contest.
According to Yahoo! Sports’ Ross Dellenger, the Georgia-Georgia Tech game is moving to Black Friday in primetime on ABC.
Other kickoff times are expected to be released on Thursday starting at 2:30 p.m. ET, with the times and networks set to be revealed for many games in the first three weeks of the season, as well as a few other marquee matchups.
The Georgia-Georgia Tech game is just one of dozens that will be on ABC this year as the SEC’s new television deal kicks in.
The SEC inked a 10-year deal with ESPN and ABC worth nearly $3 billion in late 2020, and in Summer 2021, OU and Texas announced their plans to leave the Big 12 to join the league. Now with 16 teams, its new look will debut with Florida vs. Miami on Aug. 31.
Last year, SEC commissioner Greg Sankey spoke about why the agreement is a big win for the league and said it goes beyond the $300 million per year. He mentioned the reach of the network going over-the-air, as well as the digital plans ESPN has going forward, as reasons why the deal came to fruition.
“What that does, and it’s something about which I’ve spoken but gets lost, is when we move to the ABC-ESPN group, we have access to more broadcast TV opportunities than perhaps we’ve ever had, certainly in recent decades,” Sankey said on McElroy and Cubelic in the Morning. “In other words, 130-plus million households with access to broadcast TV, we could literally program an ABC game at noon Eastern, 3:30 Eastern and then, that primetime window on particular Saturdays. Now, ABC and ESPN have other contractual commitments. But that’s an illustration of the breadth of reach that we are about to experience.
“And we respect and appreciate our relationship with CBS, but our move to work under the Disney heading was about more than just revenue. It was about reach, so reach through broadcast TV, reach through cable and satellite, which obviously is a changing environment.”
The SEC was the first major conference to secure a lucrative media rights deal as figures began to soar and realignment winds blew. The Big Ten later agreed to a seven-year, $7 million contract with three networks – FOX, CBS and NBC – while the Big 12 extended its deal with FOX and ESPN earlier than expected.
On3’s Nick Schultz also contributed to this report.