In the wake of the New Orleans New Year’s terror attack that killed 15 and injured dozens more in the early hours of Jan. 1, New Orleans police, local and state authorities and members of the Sugar Bowl committee decided to postpone the 2025 Sugar Bowl, originally scheduled to kick off at 8:45 p.m. ET on Wednesday.
With a new start time for the final College Football Playoff quarterfinal scheduled for the following afternoon — the game is set to begin Thursday at 4 p.m. ET — the Georgia and Notre Dame football programs spent much of their mournful New Year’s Day at their team hotels, the Associated Press reports.
The Caesars Superdome was locked down for security sweeps in the morning and early afternoon, during which time the teams reportedly held various meetings in hotel conference rooms.
In the evening, once the venue had been cleared and deemed safe, Georgia players were bussed in and walked through a practice session.
Bulldogs fans who had traveled to New Orleans to watch the semifinal game reportedly crowded around the team’s buses as they shuttled players to and from the Superdome.
Meanwhile, across town, Notre Dame players gathered with family and friends in a conference room and watched as the Ohio State Buckeyes took down the first-seeded and previously unbeaten Oregon Ducks in the Rose Bowl quarterfinal game.
With their win in Pasadena, No. 8 Ohio State became the third team to book a ticket to the College Football Playoff’s semifinal round.
The Buckeyes will meet the fifth-seeded Texas Longhorns — who squeaked past Arizona State in the second overtime in the Chick-fil-A Peach Bowl on Wednesday afternoon — in the Cotton Bowl on Jan. 10.
On the other side of the bracket, Penn State awaits the winner of Thursday’s Sugar Bowl.
Notre Dame or Georgia will face off against the sixth-seeded Nittany Lions in the Orange Bowl, scheduled to kick off at 7:30 p.m. ET on Jan. 9, with a bid to the championship game on the line.
A driver in a white pickup truck ran revelers over at around 3:15 a.m. on New Year’s Day in what the FBI is investigating as an act of terror.
The suspect, 42-year-old Shamsud-Din Jabbar, was killed during a shootout with police.
