The City of Charlotte and the CIAA were synonymous with each other for over a decade as the burgeoning metropolitan area hosted the conference’s signature event – its men’s and women’s basketball tournament.
If some city leaders have their way, the conference championship could soon be coming to the city. The Charlotte Post is reporting that North Carolina’s largest city is planning on putting in a bid to bring the CIAA Football Championship Game to Charlotte starting in 2025.
“We’re going to put our best foot forward to hopefully bring this from Salem, Virginia to Memorial Stadium,” City Council member James Mitchell told Herbert L. White of the Charlotte Post. “It’s a three-year obligation. And we’ve got the ‘A’ team — all hands on deck.”
The CIAA Football Championship Game called North Carolina home in 2014 and 2015 before relocating to Salem, VA in 2016 in reaction to controversial HB-2.
“I think we’ve got to reimagine our relationship” with the CIAA, Mitchell said. “The way we [lost] that basketball tournament, it tells me we need to rebrand and show the CIAA — particularly because their office is here — that we are committed to their conference. I think the best way to do that is take the football championship and make it a marquee event for them.”
The game would be hosted at venerable Memorial Stadium – a 10,000-seat stadium in Uptown Charlotte. It has undergone extensive renovations in recent years.
Charlotte, however, isn’t the only city that has expressed some level of interest in bidding for the game. The conference announced in January was opening the bidding process for the 2025 through 2027 CIAA Football Championships. The Winston-Salem Journal reported a few weeks later that officials in that city were positioning for a bid as well. The game was set to be played at Bowman Gray Stadium in 2013, but didn’t take place due to a fight.
“With the recent renovations to the stadium, I think Winston-Salem and Bowman Gray Stadium would be an excellent host for the CIAA championship football game,” Assistant City Manager Ben Rowe told John Dell of the Winston-Salem Journal in an email.
Landing the CIAA football championship game wouldn’t ease the pain of the huge economic impact loss by the CIAA basketball tournament’s move to Baltimore. However, Mitchell sounds hopeful it might re-kindle good feelings between the city and the conference, whose offices are based in Charlotte.
“We think it’s a better location,” Mitchell said. “It’s a great opportunity for them to rebrand the football championship and then at the same time, start to build goodwill with the CIAA.”