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Michigan State

Michigan State to play primetime games in back-to-back weeks to start the 2025 season

On3 imageby: Paul Konyndyk05/29/25PKonyndyk
Michigan State football helmet (1)

Michigan State, along with the rest of the Big Ten Conference programs, learned the dates and times for football games during the first three weekends of the 2025 season on Thursday afternoon when the Big Ten released its early season kick-off times and network designations.

The Spartans will play their season opener on Friday night (August 29) at 7:00 pm against Western Michigan in a game that will be broadcast on FS1. The 2025 season opener marks the 11th time in the past 15 years that Michigan State will open the season at home on Friday night. The Spartans have opened the season on Friday night 13 times since 2011.

Michigan State’s season opener is one of the six Big Ten games that will be played on Thursday or Friday night during the opening week of the college football season. The majority of those six Thursday and Friday games will be played on Thursday. Like Michigan State, Illinois will open the 2025 football season on Friday night. Whereas the Spartans play their season opener on FS1, Illinois will have its season opener broadcast on Peacock.

Michigan State will also play in primetime in Week 2 with a 7:30 pm game against Boston College to be televised NBC. The game against Boston College is the second game of a home-and-home series between the Eagles and the Spartans, who faced each other last season in a primetime thriller in the Red Bandana Game.

After playing in primetime during the first two weeks of the football season, Michigan State will play on Saturday afternoon (Sept. 13) in a Week 3 match-up against FCS Youngstown State that will be televised on BTN.

The Spartans move into conference play with back-to-back road games against USC (Sept. 20) and Nebraska (Oct. 4). There is, however, a bye week sandwiched between those two Big Ten games.

Additionally, Michigan State will play its homecoming game against UCLA at noon on Oct. 11. While the time for the homecoming is set, it remains to be seen which of the Big Ten’s broadcast partners will air the game.

Michigan State will also play road games against Nebraska (Oct. 4) and Indiana (Oct. 18) on Saturday afternoons. The afternoon time slots for those games are, however, up in the air. The Spartans could play at noon, 3:30, or 4:00 pm. It also remains to be seen which conference broadcast partner will air those games.  

PK’S TAKE: Nothing earth shattering in the Big Ten’s Thursday release of dates, times, and broadcast partners for early-season games. Michigan State fans can, however, take solace in the fact that none of those early-season games will be broadcast on Peacock. Does complaining about the streaming service partner of the Big Ten a warning that I am dangerously close to being in one of those Geico commercials about turning into your parents? Probably. It will get even worse when I start complaining about how much covering night games drains me body and soul.

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