Three-Hour College GameDay to Open 2010 Season Sept. 4 from Atlanta for LSU vs. North Carolina

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ESPN’s two-time Emmy Award winning College GameDay Built by The Home Depot — expanded to a three-hour format and aired weekly from 9 a.m. to noon ET – will open the 2010 season in Atlanta, site of the Chick-fil-A Kickoff Game pitting LSU vs. North Carolina, Saturday, Sept. 4. The game will be televised as part of the weekly Saturday Night Football series on ABC at 8 p.m. It will mark the third consecutive season – and fourth in five years – in which the show has opened the season from Atlanta (Chick-fil-A Kickoff Game in 2009 and 2008, and Notre Dame at Georgia Tech in 2006).

ESPNU will televise the new first hour of the popular show — originating from the site of the day’s best game or the game with the most compelling storyline — from 9 a.m.-10 a.m. From 10 a.m. to noon, College GameDay will continue to air on ESPN. Each College GameDay location throughout the year will generally be determined on the preceding Monday.

The three-hour College GameDay will feature show host Chris Fowler with analysts Lee Corso, Kirk Herbstreit and Desmond Howard. Erin Andrews will join the College GameDay lineup, anchoring several segments during the first hour on ESPNU, and contributing reports, interviews and features during the ESPN portion of the show.

College GameDay, entering its 24th season and 18th season of originating from a game, won the Sports Emmy Award in 2009 and 2007 for best weekly studio show and was the recipient in 2006 of the Outstanding Contribution to Amateur Football Award, given by The National Football Foundation & College Hall of Fame Awards Committee. This year, Fowler will begin his 21st season as host of the show. Corso has been affiliated with the show since its first year while Herbstreit – who won a Sports Emmy as best studio show analyst in 2009 — will begin his 15th year and Howard his fifth.

The 2009 College GameDay season was the most-viewed season for the program, averaging 1,711,000 households, 2,034,000 viewers and a 1.7 rating for increases of 14 percent (vs. 1,504,000), 12 percent (vs. 1,815,000) and 13 percent (vs. 1.5) over 2008. The previous high was set in 2007.

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