UC Bearcats to play football series with UCLA

The University of Cincinnati football program plans to play a home-and-home series with UCLA, UC athletic director Mike Bohn said Thursday.

Bohn said the series tentatively will be in 2019 and 2020 but declined to discuss further details. Bohn spoke about some upcoming UC football series Thursday before a media tour of Nippert Stadium construction, with UC's renovated home stadium to reopen Sept. 5 against Alabama A&M (time TBA).

UC has never played Pacific 12 Conference member UCLA in football, according to the UC media guide.

The $86 million Nippert project is using private donations and no public funds. Nearly $50 million has been raised toward the project, Bohn said.

"We couldn't be more inspired by our donor base," Bohn said. "They have really created an incredible passion for the project that matches that of our coaches and our student-athletes and our recruits. That's why it's so exciting to have so many people, really in a synergistic way, recognizing the incredible vision of being able to bring UCLA, Indiana, Nebraska into Cincinnati and compete at a high level."

Future UC football series include home-and-home dates with Indiana (2020 and 2021) and Nebraska (2020 & 2025). In the near term, Miami (Fla.) visits UC on Oct. 1 this season as the back end of a home-and-home deal, and UC has a home-and-home with BYU in 2015 and 2016.

Among others, UC has single games scheduled at Michigan in 2017 and at Ohio State in 2019.