Sugar Bowl may exit Louisiana for Atlanta

NEW ORLEANS — Work crews were busy in several New Orleans hotels Wednesday, repairing damage from Hurricane Katrina.

That's good news for the Sugar Bowl.

If enough hotels in the New Orleans area are up and running by December, this year's Sugar Bowl will be played at LSU's Tiger Stadium in Baton Rouge.

If they aren't, Atlanta's Georgia Dome would be a likely alternative, Sugar Bowl executive director Paul Hoolahan is expected to tell the commissioners of the 11 Division I-A conferences at a BCS meeting Tuesday in Chicago.

"Obviously, this will not be a normal New Orleans Sugar Bowl experience," said Hoolahan, who got his first look at the bowl offices in the Superdome on Wednesday. "But I think everyone will take a little disruption, maybe more than a little disruption, to get this done.

"Our preference is to play the game in Louisiana, because the Sugar Bowl is a Louisiana event. But we are pursuing a parallel track to ensure that there is a Sugar Bowl this year."

Sugar Bowl officials will be anxiously watching the progress of restoring the Superdome, something that is expected to take at least a year.

The new BCS contract cycle begins in 2006. The Sugar Bowl is scheduled to play host not only to the national championship game after the 2007 season but the "regular" Sugar Bowl under the double-hosting format that starts next season.

Hoolahan said playing the game anywhere but New Orleans would be difficult beyond 2006. That could mean the BCS awarding the Sugar Bowl spot in the championship rotation to another bowl.

"I wouldn't be honest if I didn't tell you I'm feeling the pressure," Hoolahan said. "And I'd be foolish not to acknowledge that the commissioners don't have some of those thoughts in their minds right now."

Bowl officials hope the state will make a quick commitment to restore the Superdome and that work will begin soon.

"Our job is to be part of the recovery of the economy," Sugar Bowl president Mark Romig said. "We realize that there will have to be a reassessment of the Superdome and issues like rebuilding the levees will take first priority."

The Sugar Bowl game on Jan. 2 will match the SEC champion and an at-large team.

Neither Hoolahan nor LSU athletic director Skip Bertman see any problem with playing the game at Tiger Stadium. The problem is hotel space. Sugar Bowl fans normally occupy up to 30,000 hotel rooms in New Orleans, something the Baton Rouge area couldn't approach even if every available room weren't being used by those displaced by Hurricane Katrina.