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Country star Scotty McCreery’s love for the New England Patriots will hit a new high on Saturday, as he will sing the national anthem before the Pats’ divisional-round matchup against the Kansas City Chiefs at Gillette Stadium.
The team announced the news earlier this week:
Country star (& Pats fan!) @ScottyMcCreery will sing the national anthem at Saturday’s game:
t.co/6cZKREYdIt
Although he was born in North Carolina, McCreery, who was in attendance during last year’s AFC Conference Championship, has always been a Pats fans.
“(My dad) grew up a Boston sports fan, so that’s all he knew and he passed that down to me here in North Carolina,” he told Patriots.com. “I’m like the lone wolf, but it’s fun to be a Patriots fan down here because most folks, they’re Pats haters for sure. That makes it more interesting.”
Now 22, McCreery won the 10th season of “American Idol” when he was just 17 years old. He has since released three studio albums, with the first one hitting No. 1 on the Billboard 200, and four singles that have reached the Billboard Hot 100.
The country singer has plenty of experience in the sports world, as well. He performed for Robert Kraft and the Patriots management team during last year’s Super Bowl week, he has blogged for MLB.com and he sang the national anthem at Game 1 of the 2011 World Series:
Kickoff for Saturday’s game is scheduled for 4:35 p.m. ET, which means McCreery will perform at about 4:30 p.m. ET. The game will be on CBS and CBSSports.com, although it’s unclear if the national anthem will be shown on the broadcast.