Only 34 more days ’till SNF…
The NFL season officially kicked off this weekend in Canton, Ohio with the Chicago Bears defeating the Houston Texas 21-17 in the first preseason game of the year on Thursday. The weekend festivities continued with the induction of superstars such as Patrick Willis, Devin Hester, Julius Peppers and Dwight Freeney into the NFL Hall of Fame on Saturday.
On Sunday, none other than Carrie Underwood closed out the busy weekend in Canton with a concert at Tom Benson Hall of Fame Stadium. The 8x Grammy Award-winner played a plethora of hits, including “Undo It,” “Before He Cheats” and “Last Name;” however, it was the show’s opener that turned heads.
Underwood opened the show with her first-ever live performance of Sunday Night Football’s opening song, “Waiting All Day for Sunday Night,” and seems all but confirmed that she is returning once again this season to provide the opener for the biggest matchups of the year throughout the football season.
This will mark Underwood’s 12th season performing Sunday Night Football’s opener, first taking over for fellow female country superstar, Faith Hill, during the 2013 season.
In an interview with Sirius XM back in 2023, Underwood revealed that she records one main version of the song every year before filling in lines with all the different teams that will play throughout the NFL’s 17-week season and playoffs, “It’s one main version top to bottom and then kind of filling in lines. So, when we go in to record, we do it all at once.”
In the interview, she also noted how she’ll record a plethora of different combinations of teams just in case there’s an off-chance that different matchups and teams get their schedules flexed into the Sunday night time slot or a team not projected to do well sneaks into the playoffs:
“I do the whole main version, but then we go through and pick up all the matchups for each week of regular season football and then we go into playoff football. And I then sing every possible combination of teams that could possibly, maybe play each other, even if you know, even if in the back of your mind, you’re like, ‘I know they ain’t going to make it into the playoffs. I don’t know why we’re doing this.’ We do it anyway just because the one time you don’t they’re going to call you up and you’re going to have to go back in the studio, so just get it all done.”
Though there has been no official announcement that she is returning this year, this performance all but confirms that Underwood will be Sunday Night Football’s opener when the Los Angeles Rams play the Detroit Lions on September 8th.
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