Purdue At Cincinnati To Kickoff At Noon

Another kickoff time was announced today, and once again Morgan Burke got his way. Earlier this week Burke stated that he preferred the season opener on August 31 be a day game:

Despite rumors that Purdue's season opener at Cincinnati could be a night game, Burke said the plan is for the game to kickoff at noon on Aug. 31.

Burke said he didn't know how the rumor got started. But when he first heard it a couple weeks ago, Burke had someone in his office check with Big Ten senior associate commissioner for television administration Mark Rudner and the indication was that it would not be a night-time kickoff.

"I think if somebody was going to do something (moving the time), they would have made a contact by now," Burke said.

Yes, Morgan, we all know your affinity for noon kickoffs so you can make it to Denny's by 4:30. Well, he gets his way again as the game at Cincy will kick off at noon and be televised on ESPNU. It is interesting, however,t hat Morgan contacted the Big Ten Commish for TV administration when the Big Ten has NOTHING to do with the TV rights for this game! Cincinnati, as the home team, has the rights and, in turn, their conference (The American Athletic Conference). The home team's TV deal always takes precedence. This is why Purdue is always on NBC at Notre Dame, and in its non-conference, non-Notre Dame road game years it falls on another channel. Past similar games were on CBS Sports (Rice 2011), Fox Sports (Oregon 2009), ESPNU (Toledo 2007) or not even on TV (Arizona 2005) because of the home team's TV deal.