Those looking for Chris Fowler on ABC’s Saturday night Game of the Week will see Rece Davis in his place. No, Davis is not taking both Gameday and the play-by-play duties away from him. Rather, Fowler is calling the US Open this week and was unable to make the game in East Lansing. Fowler is expected back for next week’s Game of the Week.
For over two decades Chris Fowler hosted ESPN College Gameday but the network announced over the offseason that a mutual decision was made for Fowler to step away from Gameday. Rece Davis is now the new host of College Gameday.
Fowler decided to make the move for a few reasons. One is to focus on calling ABC’s Game of the Week. Last season, Fowler juggled hosting Gameday then flying to wherever the game happened to be in order to do play-by-play with Kirk Herbstreit. Additionally, he calls tennis matches as well so it frees up a bit more time to focus on live play-by-play broadcasts.
Fowler was recently asked by Sports Illustrated whether he would watch College Gameday now that he is no longer on the show. He had this to say:
That’s a good question because I don’t know how I am going to feel. I love the people on the show and I will be a fan of GameDay down the line but I don’t know how I’m going to feel on Saturday mornings. I think it’s going to feel like an out-of-body experience. I’m usually good at visualizing times and places but I don’t know what’s going to happen. I’m not sure how I will feel watching it.”
On the 2015 kickoff show, College Gameday did a touching tribute to Fowler and brought him on to the set for a live interview. The entire Gameday crew was visibly emotional about the tribute. Afterwards, he sent out a series of tweets in response to the experience:
Surreal morning: Heading to @CollegeGameDay as a guest. Means a lot to me to be able to say Thank You to so many for 25 wonderful seasons
and now the show goes on. @ESPN_ReceDavis superb start to long, successful run. @CollegeGameDay moveable feast will always serve viewers
