Penn State football is likely headed toward a Black Friday meeting against Michigan State in East Lansing according to ESPN’s Pete Thamel.
Thamel’s reporting covers a wide swath of issues new Big Ten Commissioner Tony Petitti is facing as the league looks to lock down the particulars of its massive media rights deal minted at around $7 billion. The deal, and most of its particulars, were negotiated by now former Big Ten Commissioner Kevin Warren.
“Ohio State, Penn State and Michigan State recently agreed to concessions to make short-term sacrifices to help the league make up for some lost revenue from the NBC deal,” Thamel wrote. “Penn State will play on the road in a short week on Black Friday against Michigan State, a game that was scheduled before Penn State agreed to it.”
Historically Penn State – alongside some of the Big Ten’s bigger and more regularly attended programs — have been against playing Friday night games at home, citing issues filling their respective massive stadiums just hours after the end of the work day. This issue has rung particularly true for Penn State which sees a significant portion of its home crowd travel from out of town each weekend.
While Penn State has been opposed to playing Friday night games at home, the Nittany Lions have played Friday night contests before, facing Maryland in 2019 in College Park on a Friday night and Illinois on Friday night in 2018. Penn State opened its 2022 season on the road against Purdue on a Thursday but the date of a season opener – especially on the road – poses different and more manageable hurdles. Challenges or not, the Nittany Lions won all three games.
All things considered if Penn State’s regular season finale were to end up being played on a Friday it would come after two-straight weeks at Beaver Stadium and a fairly favorable stretch of scheduling. The Nittany Lions close out the year against the Spartans following clashes against Michigan and Rutgers with the trip to East Lansing around November 24th or 25th marking Penn State’s first venture to anywhere further away than Maryland since an October 21st clash against Ohio State in Columbus.
Elsewhere on Penn State’s schedule the Nittany Lions will host West Virginia air on NBC for a 7:30 p.m. kick, and Iowa for a Sept. 23 White Out clash slated for a later 8 p.m. start.
