Orange, cotton bowl dates won’t change after sugar bowl delay, CFP spokesman says

The Orange Bowl will be played on Jan. 9 as scheduled, a College Football Playoff spokesman confirmed to Blue-White Illustrated on Thursday.

“We will not be moving the Orange or Cotton Bowls,” College Football Playoff senior director of communications and branding Brett Daniels said in an email.

Some have wondered if the date of the Orange Bowl might be flipped with the date of the Cotton Bowl, which is the site of the other CFP semifinal, which will be played Jan. 10 in Dallas and feature. Texas vs. Ohio Statebecause the last quarterfinal game, the Sugar Bowl, was moved back a day after a deadly truck attack in New Orleans on Wednesday. The winner of the match which is set to be played at 4pm today between Georgia and Notre Damefaces Penn State in Miami.

With all status quo, Penn State will have a two-day-rest advantage over either the Bulldogs or the Fighting Irish after beating Boise State 31-14 in Tuesday night’s Fiesta Bowl. However, it is worth pointing out that both teams had a week off in December. Georgia did so by earning a first-round bye. And Notre Dame, which is an Independent, was off during conference championship weekend.

Regardless, the break angle will certainly be discussed a lot in the run-up to kickoff. It’s 7:30pm ET next Thursday at Hard Rock Stadium.

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New start time for the Sugar Bowl was chosen with the Orange Bowl in mind

The Sugar Bowl was originally set for 8:45 PM ET on January 1st. Originally it was thought that the postponed competition would start at the same time, precisely on 2 January. But ESPN reports that both teams lobbied for an earlier start time. Therefore, kickoff is now at 16 ET today.

“The reason they landed at 4 p.m. Eastern, three central is because there’s an extremely quick turnaround for which team wins this game in the Orange Bowl, which is a week away, so there’s less time to prepare on the team to play Penn State in that game,” ESPN reporter Laura Rutledge said Thursday ‘Rise up’ show.

“As you so well said, all of that pales in comparison to what happened here and the tragedy that certainly occurred. But these teams had to think about the schedule and do what’s best for the athletes and everyone involved. The postponement of 24 hours? At first we thought it would be a true 24 hours, it would be a game that was going to happen tonight, but we started getting word that both teams pressed towards the earlier start time, as early as possible start time, for today.”

Penn State is back in State College

The staff is certainly spending time preparing for both the Bulldogs and the Fighting Irish. It will be able to evaluate the tape live as it prepares for the semi-finals. Penn State stayed in Arizona on Tuesday night and flew home to State College on Wednesday. The team will travel to Miami in the afternoon next Tuesday.