Broadcasting Crew Announced as Music City Bowl Turns Into Punchline

We now know whose dulcet tones will accompany the Big Blue Nation for the Music City Bowl, a game that is slowly devolving into one big joke across the college football world.

Kentucky and Iowa kick off on New Year’s Eve at Noon EST at Nashville’s Nissan Stadium. ESPN is sending its Thursday night crew to call the game on ABC. Matt Barrie and former Monday Night Football broadcaster Louis Riddick will be in the booth, while Harry Lyles Jr. reports from the sideline.

Most of the game’s viewers are Sickos. Neither team will be fielding its starting quarterback. Spencer Petras suffered a season-ending injury and Will Levis will remain on the sideline, along with Chris Rodriguez, to get healthy ahead of the NFL Draft. The Music City Bowl is on its way to having the lowest point total in college football history at 31.5. The college football world is excited to watch the action for all the wrong reasons.

Bowl Season is nearly upon us, so let's look at what the market says about the matchups. What better News Years Eve plans are there than Iowa-Kentucky #CFB #CollegeFootball pic.twitter.com/y1gN3Zyzay

— CFBNumbers (@CFBNumbers) December 8, 2022

Sports Illustrated’s Ross Dellenger ranked all 41 games based on their watchability. The Music City Bowl is his most anticipated matchup this bowl season.

“Watch it because you despise offensive football,” Dellenger writes. “These two teams combine—combine—to average about 580 yards a game. That’s only 40 yards below what Tennessee averages a game. If you’re asking yourself why this is No. 1, then you don’t get the joke.”

Over at CBS, Tom Fornelli shared a similar sentiment, although he is not as intrigued to watch this game for one big reason: we just watched this game a year ago, and it was actually kind of awesome.

“OK, so here’s the thing. As a connoisseur of all kinds of college football, this matchup interests me. I don’t need high-octane offenses and a bunch of touchdowns to be entertained. I’m the kind of person who can tune into a field-position battle and enjoy that just as much as I would a 49-48 game. So these two offenses don’t scare me away,” says Fornelli.

“The problem is we just saw this game last year as Kentucky defeated Iowa 20-17 in a very entertaining Citrus Bowl. Having the rematch a year later takes some of the shine off it. We can’t even go with the angle of Mark Stoops facing his alma mater because it was beaten to death last year.”

Prepare for a slugfest of epic proportions in the Music City Bowl.