ESPN’s College Gameday picks its broadcast location a week before the show goes live during the college football season. This coming Saturday, the gang will be in Baton Rouge for a top 10 SEC matchup between Florida and LSU. After that, who knows what comes next for the 2019 season.
As for the 2020 season, we got an answer over the weekend. Rese Davis announced during Saturday’s show in Gainesville, Florida that College Gameday will make its first international trip to open next year’s college football season.
ESPN is taking College Gameday to Ireland for the week 0 matchup between Notre Dame and Navy. This will not be the first time college football has been played in the country.
“College GameDay has built its legacy travelling from city to city, campus to campus showcasing the unmatched passion of college football fans and the pageantry surrounding the game,” ESPN Senior Vice President of Production Lee Fitting said in a press release. “The Notre Dame-Navy rivalry serves as the perfect backdrop for College GameDay’s inaugural international appearance. We look forward to giving the great fans of Ireland and the thousands of Americans traveling to Dublin an unforgettable experience.”
The Irish and the Midshipmen will be the seventh game played in the country. Those same two teams have previously met at Croke Park in 1996 and Aviva Stadium, which will also host the 2020 game, in 2012. Notre Dame won both games.
As for ESPN, the Dublin trip will mark the 385th time College Gameday has been on the road. It will almost certainly be the most expensive production ever staged, as it is the first time Gameday is leaving North America.
