Several college football games were relocated and/or scheduled due to the impending impact of Hurricane Ian throughout Florida. The storm also will affect this week’s NFL and NHL schedules.
Florida was scheduled to host Eastern Washington at noon EDT Saturday in Gainesville, Fla, but that game was moved to noon Sunday on the Gators’ campus.
South Florida was scheduled to face East Carolina on Saturday in Tampa; however, that game will now be played at 2:30 p.m. Saturday at Florida Atlantic University Stadium in Boca Raton, Fla. South Florida vice president of athletics Michael Kelly said Tuesday: “With Hurricane Ian building into a powerful and potentially very impactful storm on the Bay area, the people and resources in our community, we felt it was in everyone’s best interest to move our game out of the Tampa Bay area.”
South Carolina announced Tuesday that its game against South Carolina State, scheduled for Saturday, was moved to 7 p.m. Thursday in Columbia, S.C. South Carolina athletics director Ray Tanner said: “Due to the potential impact of the hurricane on Columbia and the surrounding area, it is in the best interest of safety to play the game on Thursday rather than Saturday afternoon.”
As of press time, Central Florida is still planning to host SMU on Saturday in Orlando, Fla; and Florida State is still scheduled to host Wake Forest on Saturday in Tallahassee, Fla. Clemson also is still on track to host N.C. State on Saturday in Clemson, S.C., which is located about 1:30 miles west of Columbia.
The NFL and NHL schedule also was impacted due to the weather in Florida. The Tampa Bay Lightning postponed two preseason games, scheduled for Wednesday and Thursday against the Carolina Hurricanes and Nashville Predators, respectively. They did not announce make-up dates for those games. In the NFL, the Tampa Bay Buccaneers announced Monday that they relocated football operations from Tampa, Fla., to Miami due to the path of the hurricane. The Buccaneers are still scheduled to host the Kansas City Chiefs at 8:20 p.m. Sunday at Raymond James Stadium in Tampa.
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