If the Atlanta Sports Council has their way, college football teams won’t just be playing for a national title in 2014, but for all of the chicken sandwiches. They’re joining forces with the Chick-fil-A Bowl, the Atlanta Convention & Visitors Bureau, the Georgia Dome and the Atlanta Falcons to lure college football semifinals and finals to the city once the new playoff system kicks in.
Atlanta Putting Together Tasty College Football Playoff Bid
The semifinals of the new playoffs are going to rotate through six bowls, and everyone has a chance to join the fun. The bowls that rotate as semifinal sites aren’t necessarily going to be the current established BCS bowls, so currently smaller bowls that are played in big cities or top-notch facilities will have a chance to become big-time events.
Much like the Super Bowl, the final will move around based on what city and facility offers up the best package from year to year. The Falcons are currently working on plans for a state-of-the-art stadium with a retractable roof that they would like to complete by 2017, and that stadium would obviously be part of a championship game bid if it was completed. Atlanta Sports Council executive director Dan Corso thinks the Georgia Dome is attractive as a championship game site, however, and won’t be discouraged from bidding for the game before the new stadium is completed.
“We have the Georgia Dome currently standing, which is a premiere facility,” Corso said. “... As we work later in the rotation, I think a new stadium would fit into that.”
Stokan said a new state-of-the-art stadium “would further differentiate” an Atlanta bid from competitors. But he said the Georgia Dome would be an attractive site as well, noting that it will host college basketball’s Final Four next year and has a stellar record of hosting marquee college-football events such as the SEC Championship game.
Atlanta will almost certainly be joined in the bidding for a permanent rotating semifinal slot by the four established BCS Bowls, as well as the Cotton Bowl and the Capital One Bowl.
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