LG and Rachael Ray Host 'LG NCAA® Cook-Off' With Basketball Great Grant Hill

Home Appliance Leader Tips Off NCAA March Madness® with On-Air Cooking Competition

News provided by

Mar 16, 2015, 11:00 ET

NEW YORK, March 16, 2015 /PRNewswire/ -- LG Electronics USA, Official Corporate Partner of the NCAA and exclusive home appliance sponsor of the Emmy® Award-winning lifestyle talk show, "Rachael Ray," teamed up with Rachael Ray herself and two-time NCAA champion, Grant Hill, to host an on-air cook-off among avid college basketball fans for the opportunity to experience the 2015 NCAA Men's Final Four® in person. The LG NCAA Cook-Off supports LG's mission for March Madness – to help fans 'Do Game Day Right^TM,' with products that improve the game day experience at home and in the stadium.

During today's episode of Rachael Ray, Hill teamed up with four NCAA basketball super-fans, Alee Gossen, Erica Sadowsky, Jennifer Myers and Todd Williams who are representing Oklahoma State, Indiana University, University of North Carolina and Oregon State University, respectively. The four competitors were chosen because they share a passion for their school's basketball teams. Hill himself was a 1994 Atlantic Coast Conference Men's Basketball Player of the Year and a two-time NCAA champion while attending Duke. He then went on to have a successful 18-year career as a pro-basketball player.

The super-fans competed head-to-head and cooked up their best game-day dishes, including pistols firing fajitas and cowboy queso, baked goat cheese, tomato and pine nut dip, pimento grilled cheese sandwich with hush puppies and chicken nachos, for an opportunity to win the ultimate prize: a trip to the Final Four® weekend, April 4-6, in Indianapolis. After participants waged a full-court press throughout the competition, Hill crowned Jennifer Myers the winner. Each of the other three finalists won LG's 55-inch class (54.6 inches measured diagonally) 4K Ultra HD Smart LED TV with webOS (model 55UB8200) with four times the resolution (8.3 million pixels; 3840 x 2160 resolution) of Full HD for amazing clarity.

"My thanks to our good friends at LG for making all of this possible," said Rachael Ray. "The contestants cooked away in the LG kitchen set up right in our studio, including the LG Door-in-Door French-door refrigerator – the same one I have in my set kitchen! It's beautiful!"

David VanderWaal, vice president of marketing for LG Electronics USA, shared Ray's enthusiasm. "Teaming up with Rachael and Grant in this friendly cooking competition is the perfect way to kick off March Madness and involve fans. LG helps fans Do Game Day Right, whether it's providing quick access to favorite game day food and drinks in the fridge or the picture perfect viewing experience offered by LG's 4K ULTRA HD TVs."

The super-fans who participated in the cook-off prepared their game-day dishes using LG's award-winning suite of kitchen appliances, featured on The Rachael Ray Show. They include the 4-door French door refrigerator that provides a quick and easy way to access ingredients via the Door-in-Door® compartment and the flexibility of a refrigerator or soft freezer space with the CustomChill™ drawer – perfect for items such as party platters. LG's electric double-oven range offers the best cooking technology along with LG's EasyClean™ technology that allows for quick and easy clean-up.

Please visit www.LGGameDayHub.com to learn how LG helps you do game day right and enjoy a variety of games, contests and sweepstakes.

About LG Electronics USA
A proud Official Corporate Partner of the NCAA, LG Electronics USA, Inc., based in Englewood Cliffs, N.J., is the North American subsidiary of LG Electronics, Inc., a $56 billion global force and technology leader in consumer electronics, home appliances and mobile communications. In the United States, LG Electronics sells a range of stylish and innovative home entertainment products, mobile phones, home appliances, commercial displays, air conditioning systems and solar energy solutions, all under LG's "Life's Good" marketing theme. LG Electronics is an ENERGY STAR Partner of the Year. For more information, please visit www.lg.com.

About the NCAA
The NCAA is a membership-led nonprofit association of colleges and universities committed to supporting academic and athletic opportunities for more than 460,000 student-athletes at more than 1,000 member colleges and universities. Each year, more than 54,000 student-athletes compete in NCAA championships in Divisions I, II and III sports. Visit www.ncaa.org and www.ncaa.com for more details about the Association, its goals and members and corporate partnerships that help support programs for student-athletes. The NCAA is proud to have the following elite companies as official Corporate Champions—AT&T, Capital One and Coca-Cola—and the following elite companies as official Corporate Partners—Allstate, Amazon (Kindle), Buffalo Wild Wings, Buick, Burger King, Enterprise, Infiniti, LG Electronics USA, Lowe's, Nabisco, Northwestern Mutual, Reese's (Hershey's), Unilever and UPS.

About The Rachael Ray Show
RACHAEL RAY, the 2008 and 2009 Emmy® Award-winning Outstanding Talk Show, is distributed and produced by CBS Television Distribution in association with Harpo Productions, Scripps Networks and Watch Entertainment. Janet Annino is the Executive Producer. CBS Television Distribution is a unit of CBS Corp.

Photo - http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20150316/181992

Logo - http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20150223/177278LOGO

SOURCE LG Electronics USA