Arizona State and Kansas play a Big 12 conference game at Wembley Stadium in London on Saturday, September 19, 2026. It is the first Union Jack Classic and the first FBS game ever played in England. The short answer for why: the Big 12 is deliberately chasing an international audience, and a promoter built an event to give it one.
The Deal Behind It
The Big 12 announced the game in October 2025 as part of a multi-year agreement with the Union Jack Classic, a series founded by a group of sports marketing agencies with experience bringing American sports to the UK and Europe. The event is led by Brian Dubiski and Thomas Hensey of Rhino Marketing alongside Rob Yowell of Gemini Sports. The agreement covers more than one year, so this is intended as an annual fixture rather than a one off.
Commissioner Brett Yormark has pushed international expansion harder than any of his peers since taking over the conference, and London is the clearest expression of that strategy. Reporting around the announcement indicated additional Big 12 matchups were under discussion for future years.
Why These Two Teams
Practicality as much as anything. This is a conference game that counts in the Big 12 standings, with Kansas as the designated home team, so one program gives up a home date rather than both schools burning a nonconference slot. Arizona State brings a large international student population to the pitch, something the university leaned on publicly when the game was announced.
There is also a scheduling accident in the story. The Big 12’s TCU against North Carolina game had originally been offered to the Union Jack Classic, but Wembley was not available for the Week 0 date. That game went to the Aer Lingus College Football Classic in Ireland instead, and Kansas against Arizona State became the London fixture, which is how a conference game ended up on another continent in the middle of September rather than a neutral nonconference opener.
Why Wembley
Wembley holds 90,000 and has hosted 34 regular season NFL games since 2007, so the logistics of putting American football in that building are well understood. It had never hosted college football. Organizers are staging the full apparatus around it, tailgates, marching bands, cheerleaders and a halftime show, because the pitch to a British audience is the culture as much as the game.
What It Means for the Game Itself
Kansas carries the home designation but there will be no home crowd in any meaningful sense, so the usual home field advantage mostly evaporates. Both teams travel roughly the same distance and both deal with the same time change. The 5 p.m. London kickoff is noon Eastern, which is 10 a.m. in Lawrence and 9 a.m. in Tempe, so both rosters are playing on a body clock that says morning.
The result still counts in the Big 12 race, which is the part that separates this from an exhibition.
Is This the First College Football Game in London?
It is the first at Wembley and the first involving FBS programs in England. It is not the first college football game ever played in London. Ireland has hosted the Aer Lingus College Football Classic in Dublin for several years, which is a separate event in a different country.
Related
Arizona State vs. Kansas start time and TV · Big 12 standings · Week 3 schedule · College football scores
The Bottom Line
Arizona State and Kansas are in London because the Big 12 signed a multi-year deal to stage conference games at Wembley, and because a scheduling conflict pushed this particular matchup into the slot. Kickoff is noon ET on Saturday, September 19, on FS1.