Nine college football games got new kickoff times because the air traffic system broke on a Friday afternoon. The FAA halted every departing flight in the country at 3:54 p.m. ET, and the stop ran a little over four hours. By the time it lifted, teams from Seattle to Tempe were sitting on planes, back on campus or looking for a bus. Saturday’s slate was already loaded, and the conferences and the networks had to rebuild it overnight.

On3’s Pete Nakos reported the new times on X: “Washington @ Michigan State is moving to 5:30 p.m. ET on the Big Ten Network. Kick changes: Kansas @ W. Virginia, 3:30 p.m. ET. Auburn @ Miss State, 4:15 p.m. ET. Arizona State @ UCF, 5:30 p.m. ET. Tulane @ Rice, 4:30 p.m. ET. FAU @ Tulsa, 7:15 p.m. ET. More kick changes: Baylor @ BYU, 7 p.m. ET; Utah @ Arizona, 10:30 p.m. ET.”

No games were cancelled, and as of late Friday, only one game has been pushed to Sunday, as most of the changes were late kickoffs. Washington-Michigan State was 4:15 before, while Kansas-West Virginia was 5:30, and it moved up two hours into the slot Arizona State-UCF vacated. Auburn-Mississippi State was noon. Arizona State-UCF was 3:30on ESPN2 and is now on ESPNU. Tulane-Rice was 2:00, and FAU-Tulsa was 3:30 before the time change. Meanwhile, the ninth schedule change came in the SEC, where Ole Miss at Oklahoma was officially pushed to Sunday at 1:00 p.m. ET (noon CT).

Auburn is 5-4, and Mississippi State is 4-5, and the Tigers’ four-hour bus ride is why they lost their noon window. Arizona State and UCF were both 5-4 going in. FAU already has bowl eligibility locked; as for Washington, the stakes are the trip itself, with no good way to drive to East Lansing from Seattle.

Because this happened in Week 11, the timing couldn’t be worse for teams on the bubble. Programs sitting at five wins, like Auburn, Arizona State, and UCF, need just one more victory to reach bowl eligibility, and losing a night of hotel rest for same-day flights or last-minute bus rides makes winning away from home much tougher, especially for road teams like Auburn and Arizona State.

On top of that, ranked teams like Utah, BYU, and Ole Miss are fighting to stay alive in their conference title races and the College Football Playoff picture, meaning one tired or disrupted performance, whether flying on game day like Utah, waiting on a delayed opponent like BYU, or having a game pushed to Sunday like Ole Miss, could ruin their entire season.

The cause was messy, as Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy blamed old hardware and routers that got overloaded with data. Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin said patches to the old system also overwhelmed it.

With both officials confirming that there was no sign of attack, the schedules moved ahead after the delay as usual. FlightAware counted more than 7,700 canceled flights and 8,000 delayed on Friday as it was the only second nationwide ground stop since 9/11.

Same-day flights and emergency bus rides

Arizona State deplaned and plans to fly nearly 2,000 miles to Orlando on Saturday morning; Washington returned to campus, then headed back to Boeing Field. Tulane decided to bus about five hours to Houston. The school with the clearest read on the situation was Washington. Assistant athletic director Jeff Bechthold said: “The team had not yet boarded its plane before the FAA grounded all flights. We await word, just like the rest of the country.”

Duffy said larger movements would get priority and told football teams to “reach out to the FAA to schedule their flight times, as most college teams fly charters, and charters were low on the priority list once flights restarted. Utah’s game was moved three hours as they tried to leave on Friday night, but were stopped as their crew had timed out.

All eight crews were reported on site, and all Big Ten officials were already there, so referees were not the problem. Meanwhile, Oregon State still had to scramble to reach Boise State. After a nine-hour bus ride proved unworkable, the Beavers headed to the Eugene airport late Friday night to catch a flight to Idaho in time for their Saturday kickoff.

That Sunday shift didn’t sit well with Oklahoma, whose athletic department pushed back against SEC commissioner Greg Sankey’s decision since it leaves the Sooners with a short prep week before facing Texas A&M.