Detroit Lions vs. New England Patriots preseason Week 3: Game time, TV schedule, online streaming, more

Friday night football. It’s a classic throwback to high school. You know, high school ball that Matthew Stafford once played in Texas? Remember that, ESPN?

Stafford will be lacing them up again this Friday night, but it won’t be for Highland Park Fighting Scots. It’ll be for the Detroit Lions’ highly-anticipated third preseason game for the 2017 season.

That’s right. I’s finally here. No more waiting. No more meaningless games against inferior opponents. The offseason is over and we’re finally going to see the Detroit Lions play an important game.

Okay, I’m overselling it a bit. Okay, a lot. This is still the preseason, the games don’t really matter, and even if the Detroit Lions end up looking like a much better team than the New England Patriots on Friday, it probably won’t mean anything (see: 2013).

Still, this is the dress rehearsal game, and we’ll get a good look at the first stings of both teams for somewhere around a half of football. Better yet, the Lions will face a team that isn’t absolutely horrible.

The NFL champions are in town and will provide a measuring stick for this Lions team that has a lot of analysts puzzled. It may be a vanilla playbook, it may end up meaning nothing at all, but we’ve been without Lions football for over seven months, and this is the first thing resembling an exciting game since then.

Here’s all of the information you need to know for Friday’s game.

TV Schedule

Location: Ford Field—Detroit, MI

Date: Friday, Aug. 25, 2017

Time: 7:00 p.m ET

Local TV channel: FOX-2 Detroit (Check local listings here for those outside Detroit)

NFL Network replay date/time:

• Airtime #1: Saturday, Aug. 26—12 a.m. ET
• Airtime #2: Saturday, Aug. 26—4 p.m. ET
• Airtime #3: Wednesday, Aug. 30—4 p.m. ET

Announcers: Matt Shepard (Play-by-Play); Chris Spielman (Analyst); Tori Petry/Jennifer Hammond (Sideline)

Radio: AM 760 WJR (Dan Miller and Jim Brandstatter)

Online stream: NFL Game Pass

Enemy Blog: Pats Pulpit