The FBS trend of playing college football in NFL stadiums will continue to increase deep into this decade.
In a press release sent out Wednesday afternoon, and following up on reports from earlier in the week, BYU announced that it has scheduled a future four-game series against future fellow football independent UMass. The first two games will be played at LaVell Edwards Stadium in Provo on Oct. 8, 2016, and Nov. 18, 2017. The next two will be played Nov. 10, 2018, and Nov. 23, 2019 at Gillette Stadium in Foxborough.
Gillette is the home of the NFL’s New England Patriots. The Minutemen played all of their home games there in 2012 and 2013 as the capacity for their own stadium was being expanded above the FBS-minimum of 15,000.
“With UMass joining BYU as an independent football program in 2016 this series makes a lot of sense for both schools,” said BYU athletic director Tom Holmoe in a statement. “It will be a great experience for our team to play at Gillette Stadium—home of the New England Patriots —in front of the BYU faithful in that part of the country.”
The Minutemen announced in March of this year that they would be leaving the MAC following the 2015 season.
The 2016 game, incidentally, will mark the first-ever meeting between the two football programs.