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David Hale, ESPN Staff Writer
Wake Forest and Oregon State announced a home-and-home series Wednesday that will see the Demon Deacons head to Corvallis in 2025 and the Beavers make the return trip to Winston-Salem, North Carolina, in 2029.
For Wake Forest, the 2025 game will replace a scheduled road trip to Ole Miss, which has been canceled by the Demon Deacons, a move that generated criticism from Rebels coach Lane Kiffin.
Ole Miss beat Wake Forest 40-6 in Winston-Salem on Saturday. After the game, Kiffin criticized Wake Forest athletic director John Currie for canceling the return trip, saying that violated “an unwritten rule.”
A source told ESPN that Wake Forest had been working with Ole Miss for the past several years to move the return trip but was unable to reach an agreement.
The home-and-home with Oregon State will be more financially lucrative for Wake Forest and helps fill a need on the Beavers’ schedule created when the Pac-12 fell apart with 10 schools departing this summer.
“We are committed to making decisions that best serve our program and our student-athletes, and that includes bringing national games to Winston-Salem,” Currie said in a statement released by the school. “We have a high degree of respect for Ole Miss and their fans, and we congratulate them on their victory last weekend in sold-out Allegacy Stadium. But given the ongoing financial pressures of the new era of college athletics and our priority on continuing to grow resources to benefit our student-athletes, it was the right business decision to secure this two-game home-and-home series with Oregon State, and cancel the planned game in Oxford next year.”
Ole Miss suggested Wake Forest would pay a $1 million buyout to cancel the 2025 trip to Oxford, although sources at Wake Forest said that number was inflated. Wake Forest said in its statement that it honored the terms of the original contract with the Rebels, which dates back to 2014.