ABC picks up Cards-Cats football game for first time

By Chip Cosby / ccosby@herald-leader.com


The Kentucky-Louisville football game is coming to ABC Sports for the first time. The network has picked up the Sept. 4 season-opening contest featuring the head coaching debuts of Joker Phillips and Charlie Strong.

The game will kick off at 3:30 p.m. and is part of a three-way regional telecast that also features UCLA at Kansas State and Connecticut at Michigan.

The Kentucky-Louisville game has been picked up by the ESPN family of networks on several occasions but never by ABC.

ESPN/ABC spokesman Mike Humes said this year's game was attractive to the network for several reasons: the in-state rivalry, a matchup pitting the Southeastern Conference against the Big East, and the angle featuring two coaches in their first game on the sidelines in Phillips and Strong.

"There's a number of story lines there," Humes said.

The game will also be the first played in the newly expanded Papa John's Cardinal Stadium, which has increased its seating capacity from 42,000 to about 55,000.

UK leads the all-time series 13-9 and has won the last three games in the modern rivalry, which resumed in 1994. The Wildcats return 11 starters from a 7-6 squad a year ago, and Strong will be attempting to rebuild a Cardinals program that went three straight years without a bowl appearance under Steve Kragthorpe.

Read more: http://www.kentucky.com/2010/06/03/1291616/abc-picks-up-cards-cats-football.html#ixzz0pqwX8kPb