Tide-FSU Selected For CBS Telecast

The Southeastern Conference announced Sunday that CBS Sports will televise the Alabama-Florida State game to a national audience beginning at 4 p.m. (CDT) from Jacksonville (Fla.) Municipal Stadium.

Alabama (3-1, 2-1 SEC) and Florida State (2-1, 0-1 ACC) are meeting for just the fourth time in history this weekend and the game will be the first meeting between these two Southern football powers in 33 years.

The teams last played on Oct. 12, 1974 when No. 3-ranked Alabama, playing without its starting quarterback Richard Todd, survived a scare from Florida State 8-7 at Denny Stadium in Tuscaloosa. Bucky Berrey’s 36-yard field goal with 33 seconds left in the game provided the winning margin.

The Florida State game will mark Alabama’s first neutral site regular season game since beating Ohio State 16-10 on Aug. 25, 1986 at the Kickoff Classic in the Meadowlands.

Other SEC games to be televised on Saturday, Sept. 29 include LSU at Tulane (espn2), Mississippi State at South Carolina (Lincoln Financial Sports) and Auburn at Florida (ESPN).

CBS used its option to delay selection of this week's game. The network decided on Alabama-FSU over Auburn at Florida.

This neutral site game was arranged by FSU Athletics Director Dave Hart, a former Alabama basketball player, and Bama Athletics Director Mal Moore. The game will have something of a bowl game feel to it as the tickets were divided equally between the two schools. Also bowl-like: both teams will receive about $2 million for playing the game and will not have to share with conference brethren.

There have been rumors that Alabama is negotiating with Atlanta officials to have a similar game against Clemson of the ACC next year. Clemson is coached by Tommy Bowden, the son of FSU Coach Bobby Bowden. There has been no official announcement regarding the 2008 Alabama-Clemson possibility.