Auburn nixes UCLA game

The Los Angeles Times reported Wednesday that Auburn officials rejected an offer to open the 2010 football season with a neutral-site game against UCLA.

ABC attempted to broker the game. It would have been played in Atlanta at the Georgia Dome.

Auburn already had a full slate and has a game scheduled for that weekend. The Tigers open the 2010 season at home against Arkansas State.

“We were contacted to see if we had an opening on our 2010 schedule and we did not,” Auburn athletics director Jay Jacobs said through a released statement. “Our schedule had already been completed and contracts had been executed for the 2010 season, but as I said earlier, we welcome the opportunity to talk about future schedules with UCLA and other BCS conference schools.”

Since 2004, Auburn has set a trend of playing one marquee non-conference game per season. Non-conference opponents have included Georgia Tech, Washington State, Kansas State and West Virginia over the past four seasons.

Auburn will host WVU in 2009 before starting a home-and-home series with Clemson in 2010.