Well, as ESPN announced their first 3 locations for Gameday, they were all SEC locales. Shocker… If you’re a Clemson fan, the Tigers are part of the opener with Clemson at LSU. After that it’s Texas for Ohio State and Texas. Then it’s Ole Miss for LSU at Ole Miss. LSU is already on Gameday twice in in the first 3 weeks.
The weak Week 1 schedule does make Clemson at LSU the biggest that weekend. Texas and Ohio State speak for itself, but the LSU at Ole Miss is a manufactured hype game because of the return of Lane Kiffin to Ole Miss, especially if LSU loses to Clemson. Couldn’t they have waited until that game was over?
We know, though, this will continue throughout the year. In 2025, ESPN went to SEC locales 5 times before November. That would be 5 of the first 9 games, and 11 SEC schools featured on Gameday. In fairness to ESPN, and I’ll point this out, there wasn’t another Gameday at SEC location in the month of November.
Go back to 2024; there 8 SEC Gameday trips in the regular season, and 16 SEC schools. That’s 27 SEC participant schools on Gameday the last 2 years, and 6 for the ACC. The Big 10 had 19 over a 2-year period, and the Big 12 had just 4.
The fact is, the SEC and Big 10 had a whopping 46 schools appear on Gameday out of 58 possible school appearances. You know the schools I follow are in the ACC, and I don’t have a lot of interest in SEC and, to a lesser extent Big 10 Gameday. Gameday doesn’t care who they televise as long as people keep watching.
For me, and even though it’s still an ESPN network, I’m watching the @accnetwork ACC Huddle. At least they cover the teams I’m interested in, and they’ve improved over the last 2 – 3 years. The production is better, the analysts follow the ACC closely, and they interview ACC players and coaches. Here’s the ACC Huddle next stops.
Wednesday, @accnetwork unveiled a series of programming announcements & initiatives at #ACCKickoff
#ACCHuddle locations revealed for Wks 0-3
https://t.co/ICC6C6Tgdg pic.twitter.com/1GnDPdpZhN
— ESPN PR (@ESPNPR) July 15, 2026
