Thanksgiving dinner and football, what better two combinations are there? When November comes, and it’s the holiday season, we know what we all want. Football!

You’re currently viewing the 2022 Thanksgiving schedule. Check out the 2023 Thanksgiving Day schedule, here.

Thanksgiving Day NFL History

Thanksgiving football dates back to 1876 when college teams Yale and Princeton played each other as an annual tradition. It wasn’t till 1920 that the NFL started playing on the holiday. Professional football games were played during the 1890s when the teams were known as Pro-am and were owned by a Major League Baseball team in Pennsylvania where three teams crowned themselves as the champion. Ohio tried to have Thanksgiving Day games but that folded too because many of these players coached high school football and were not available.

In the beginning part of the NFL, several teams played regularly on Thanksgiving Day. The teams like the Chicago Bears, Chicago Cardinals (later became the Green Bay Packers, Frankford Yellow Jackets, Pottsville Maroons, Buffalo All-Americans, Canton Bulldogs, and the New York Giants. 

Detroit Lions

It wasn’t till 1934 that the Detroit Lions started playing on Thanksgiving. Then owner George A. Richards, who also owned a radio station known as WJR (NBC/ABC affiliated) played it as a gimmick to get people to come to games. He negotiated with NBC to get the Lions broadcast live across the network. 

During World War II (1941-1945) there were no Thanksgiving day games until 1945 when the Detroit Lions continued its home game tradition and played the Cleveland Rams as the only game on Thanksgiving. 

Dallas Cowboys

In 1966, the Dallas Cowboys got involved in Thanksgiving Day games. They took it upon themselves to host a Thanksgiving Day game because there was “nothing else to do”. I look at this and laugh because when you celebrate Thanksgiving what do you want to do? Sit around and watch football!

For the Cowboys though, they were a good team and everyone wanted to watch them. They were a championship-winning team during the ’60s and ’70s. This is how they claimed the phrase “America’s Team” during that time.

Since 1978, Detroit and Dallas have hosted the Thanksgiving Day games. Detroit always hosted the first game, while Dallas did the later one. Because of television network commitments in place through the 2013 season, to make sure that both the AFC-carrying network (NBC from 1965 to 1997, and CBS since 1998) and the NFC-carrying network (CBS from 1956 to 1993, and Fox since 1994) got at least one game each. One of these games was always a matchup between two NFC teams, while the other one featured an AFC-NFC matchup. This way the AFC could showcase only one team on Thanksgiving, and the AFC team was always the visiting team. 

A Change Was Made

It wasn’t until 2006 that a third game was added as a night game. This game has no affiliation with who can play and it’s up to the NFL who plays this game. All networks, except Fox (NFC-only games), can play any game on their networks. 

Every NFL team has played in a Thanksgiving day game except for the Jacksonville Jaguars. The team with the longest drought belongs to the Los Angeles Rams, who last played in 1975.

On Friday, November 11, the league announced that the Thanksgiving games will be branded as the “John Madden Thanksgiving Celebration”, honoring the memory of head coach and broadcaster John Madden. Madden called 20 Thanksgiving games during his broadcasting career. A cool thing about these Thanksgiving games is that the Madden Player of the Game will receive a trophy and a $10,000 donation in their name from the NFL Foundation to the youth or high school football program of their choice. How cool!

The 2022 Thanksgiving Games

Per tradition, we will be having three games going with the first one being the Buffalo Bills at the Detroit Lions. They are followed up by a divisional matchup of the Dallas Cowboys versus the New York Giants. Then a prime-time matchup as the New England Patriots take on the red-hot Minnesota Vikings. 

Here’s the Thanksgiving Day scheduled slate:

• Buffalo Bills vs. Detroit Lions on CBS (12:30 p.m. ET)
• New York Giants vs. Dallas Cowboys on FOX (4:30 p.m. ET)
• New England Patriots vs. Minnesota Vikings on NBC (8:20 p.m. ET)

Buffalo Bills at Detroit Lions

This will be Detroit’s 83rd Thanksgiving game (37-42-2) which is the most in NFL history. The Lions have lost five straight Thanksgiving day games and are 6-16 since 2000. For the second year in a row, the Buffalo Bills make another appearance as they look for their second straight Thanksgiving Day victory after beating the Saints 31-6 last year.

The Bills are 5-4-1 on Thanksgiving Day and lost to the Lions on Thanksgiving in 1994 by a score of 35-21. Josh Allen and the Bills should be a heavy favorite in this game. The Lions will have to do what they can to keep up with the Bills as Jared Goff and Aiden Hutchinson can do what they can to end this five-game streak. 

New York Giants at Dallas Cowboys 

This will be the Cowboys’ 55th Thanksgiving game (31-22-1), the second most behind the Detroit Lions. Currently, the Cowboys are on a three-game Thanksgiving day losing streak and are 10-12 since 2000 on the day Dallas is 71-47-2 all-time against the Giants and have won 10 of the last 11 matchups. The Giants (7-5-3 on Thanksgiving) are making their first Thanksgiving Day appearance since 2017.

The Giants (7-2) are one game ahead of the Cowboys (6-3) who are coming off a tough loss to the Green Bay Packers. With a healthy Dak Prescott back under center, can the Cowboys’ Thanksgiving Day losing streak come to an end or will Saquon Barkley have something to say about it as these two divisional rivals clash in a rematch from earlier this season? 

New England Patriots at Minnesota Vikings

Our final game of the night brings Bill Belichick back to his first Thanksgiving day game since they beat the New York Jets 49-19 in what will always be known as the infamous “butt fumble” by Mark Sanchez. The Patriots had Tom Brady then, and now have a new-look offense with Mac Jones at the helm. The Patriots are 22-20 post-Brady, but don’t let that fool you as Belichick is on a three-game (3-1 overall) Thanksgiving day streak.

Taking one of the best defenses against anyone is Belichick’s recipe for victory as they try to slow down Kirk Cousins and the 8-1 Minnesota Vikings (6-2 on Thanksgiving) who are coming off a huge win against the Buffalo Bills. Does Minnesota head coach Kevin O’Connell have what it takes to take down Bill Belichick? This game shall tell. 

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