The newfound tradition of airing college basketball immediately following a Thanksgiving NFL game will continue this year.
On Thursday, CBS announced that it’ll be broadcasting a marquee non-conference college basketball game between the Duke Blue Devils and Arkansas Razorbacks on Turkey Day. The game will tip off at 8 p.m. ET, immediately following the network’s Thanksgiving day NFL contest featuring the Dallas Cowboys at 4:30 p.m. ET.
Celebrate Thanksgiving with some hoops this year.@DukeMBB and @RazorbackMBB take the court in primetime on @CBS and @paramountplus on November 27th. pic.twitter.com/KYAZ9BD6vQ
— CBS Sports College Basketball 🏀 (@CBSSportsCBB) March 6, 2025
Both head coaches, Duke’s Jon Scheyer and Arkansas’ John Calipari, praised the decision by CBS.
Coach Scheyer and Coach Calipari share their excitement for a Thanksgiving showdown in primetime. pic.twitter.com/M3vCiOhbkC
— CBS Sports College Basketball 🏀 (@CBSSportsCBB) March 6, 2025
“We’re always looking for new and innovative ways to approach our schedule, and playing on Thanksgiving night on primetime TV is another great chance to showcase Duke Basketball on a national stage against a great opponent,” Scheyer said.
Calipari alluded to the massive television audience the game will surely draw.
“In what will be one of the most watched college basketball games in the last decade, we could not be more excited to be playing Thanksgiving Day against Duke on CBS again this season,” the Arkansas coach said, referencing the Razorbacks’ Thanksgiving game against Illinois earlier this season.
The first-year Arkansas coach is right. The past two seasons, college basketball lead-outs to Thanksgiving NFL games have been the most-watched regular season games. The aforementioned Arkansas-Illinois game drew 5.1 million viewers on CBS following the Chicago Bears-Detroit Lions game at 12:30 p.m. ET. In 2023, Michigan State-Arizona on Fox drew 5.2 million viewers in the same post-NFL window.
The upcoming Duke-Arkansas game is notable in that it’ll be the first time a network will employ the Thanksgiving NFL lead-out strategy in primetime. It’s quite possible that Fox will also use its NFL lead-out earlier in the day to air a college basketball game, though the network has not yet announced such plans.
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