If you are a sports fan or if you live with a sports fan then your weekly schedule becomes inextricably linked with what sporting events are on at what times during each week. The conflict between missing a sporting event for a poorly committed to social event and missing an appealing social event to watch a game is an important balancing act in any kind of romantic, familial, or business relationship between a sports fan and a non-sports fan. To help facilitate this complicated advanced mathematics, Dear Sports Fan has put together a table showing the most important sporting events of the upcoming week. Print it out, put it on your fridge, and go through it with your scheduling partner.
For detail on the all-popular, all-powerful NFL, which groups most of its games on Sunday afternoons, see our NFL Forecast. You can also get daily updates from our NHL forecast and NBA forecast.
Download a full-size copy here.
Monday: This week is dominated by football, soccer, and basketball. It starts off with a day that features the first two — I’m a sucker for watching the military academies play football and over the past couple decades, Navy has been the best of the bunch. They play against Pittsburgh in a bowl game at 2:30. In the evening, the Monday night NFL game is a giant one. Denver and Cincinnati, two of the hottest teams in the league over the first three quarters of the season, both have something to play for. Denver has more at stake, because they could conceivably miss the playoffs if they lose, but Cincinnati wants to win to guarantee themselves a bye week and extend the time their quarterback has to heal from a broken thumb. Football, thumbs, what else could you want?
Tuesday: The most shocking thing in all of sports may be that Leicester City is at the top of the British Premier League standings — they play against Manchester City in a rare Tuesday BPL game. There’s a trio of college football bowl games to feast on, they feature another military academy, Air Force, and LSU, with its star running back, Leonard Fournette.
Wednesday: With the excitement of New Year’s Eve and New Year’s Day, followed quickly by the last weekend of the NFL season coming up, this could easily be a forgettable sports day. I doubt it will be. With strong college football bowl games, an excellent NHL matchup, and a classic college basketball rivalry, it’s too potentially strong to go wrong.
Thursday: Happy New Year’s Eve! Don’t do anything you would want me to tell you not to do. Or at least, don’t do anything such that if I told you not to do it, you’d actually listen. Whatever. You could just stay in and watch college football. It’s hard to underestimate how good the two college football playoff semifinal games could be. This is only the second year of there being a college football playoff and if last year was an indication, it’s going to be great! If you’re determined to be watching sports when the ball drops, the basketball game between BYU and Saint Mary’s will be on.
Friday: It’s much more plausible to watch sports all day today than it was yesterday. New Year’s Day has traditionally been dominated by college football, and there are a bunch of great options (so many, in fact, that the words spilled out of their box on my calendar.) In recent years, the NHL with its outdoor “Winter Classic” has made serious inroads and for many people that is now the main sporting attraction. This year’s game pits age old rivals, Montreal and Boston, against each other in Massachusetts’ Gillette Stadium.
Saturday: Maybe this is really the down day in the sports week. Wedged between New Year’s Day and Sunday, this Saturday doesn’t have quite as much to offer as most. Then again, it may be time to break those resolutions you made. One day is enough, surely.
Sunday: The last day of the NFL’s regular season should bring some thrills. There should still be one or two playoff spots up for grabs and playoff positioning to fight for. In other sports, there are good men and women’s college basketball to watch and some decent soccer on in the morning. Enjoy!
Caveat — This forecast is optimized for the general sports fan, not a particular sports fan. As such, your mileage may vary. For instance, you or the sports fan in your life is a fan of a particular team, then a regular season MLB baseball game or MLS soccer game may be more important on a particular day than anything on the forecast above. Use the calendar as a way to facilitate conversation about scheduling, not as the last word on when there are sports to watch.