The San Francisco 49ers reportedly will place a bid later this year to host the college football playoff national championship game in a few years. The next two hosting sites have already been decided (Glendale and Tampa), but cities will be able to place bids for 2018, 2019 and 2020.
The San Francisco 49ers will bid to host the College Football Playoff championship game at Levi’s Stadium.
A person with knowledge of the plans told The Associated Press on Wednesday that the team will seek to host either the 2018, `19 or `20 title game when they come up for bid later this year. The person spoke on condition of anonymity because there has been no announcement about the plans.
Cities interested in hosting one of those three title games have until May to bid. A decision on the winners is expected in the fall.
While the semifinal games in the four-team playoff have been awarded to existing bowl games, playoff officials have opened up the championship game to all cities.
AT&T Stadium in the Dallas area hosted the first college championship game last month between Ohio State and Oregon. The next two title games have been awarded to Glendale, Arizona, and Tampa, Florida.
Levi’s Stadium opened in Santa Clara last summer as the new home for the 49ers. The stadium is one of the most technologically advanced and is located in the heart of Silicon Valley, making it a prime place to host big events.
The Super Bowl will be played there next February and the Pac-12 hosted the first of three straight conference championship games there last December.
With the 49ers breaking in a brand new stadium in Santa Clara, they will be an attractive option for future college football games. It will be interesting to see what cities end up in the running to host the big game once the list gets narrowed down a bit.