Maximum Exposure
August 29, 2006 05:44 PM | General
August 29, 2006
 |
||
| Michael Tranghese |
MORGANTOWN, W.Va. – It’s no coincidence that the Big East Conference and ESPN agreed to an unprecedented television deal following West Virginia’s stunning upset victory over Georgia in the 2006 Nokia Sugar Bowl. Since its reformation two years ago when it added basketball stalwarts Louisville, Cincinnati, DePaul and Marquette, the conference could easily ride on men’s basketball’s coattails. Today’s announcement shows that football can now stand on its own merits, says John Wildhack, ESPN Senior Vice President for Programming Acquisitions and Strategy.
“The Big East has two teams ranked in the preseason Top 10 and West Virginia coming off a great Sugar Bowl triumph against Georgia,” he said. “You’ve got two bell weather programs there.”
On the football side of the six-year deal lasting through 2013, a total of 17 games will air on ESPN, ESPN2 and ABC each season -- the highest guaranteed total for ESPN and ABC in the history of the conference, exceeding the yearly totals guaranteed when Miami, Virginia Tech and Boston College were still in the conference.
On championship Saturday in December, one Big East game will appear on ABC or ESPN with a second game shown on ESPN2. Four Big East games will be featured on ESPN’s Thursday night package and at least one game will be part of ESPN’s Saturday’s Prime Time series.
There will be two Sunday night ESPN games, a minimum of six games on ESPNU, and ESPN Regional will continue to produce and distribute its game of the week package that is syndicated throughout Big East markets and beyond, covering more than 30 million homes.
“On the football side, we’ve increased our commitment in exposure,” Wildhack said. “We’ll use ABC, ESPN, ESPN2 and again ESPN Regional Television, ESPN 360 and ESPNU. This is all about broadening the exposure for the conference, working with a willing partner, working with 16 schools to provide unprecedented and the broadest exposure possible.
“It fulfills our commitment as a company,” Wildhack said. “We want to serve sports fans wherever and however they consume content. Today’s announcement allows us to serve our fans, to serve Big East fans and Big East alumni all over the country and all over the world.”
The agreement is equally impressive on the basketball side, with ESPN and ESPN2 carrying a minimum of 60 games each year including 49 regular season games. ESPN, Inc. will produce 139 of the 144 regular season conference games with the five remaining contests being televised by CBS.
“This deal is an unprecedented deal in intercollegiate athletics between any conference and any media company,” Wildhack said. “Every conference basketball game will be televised on an ESPN network or platform -- either ESPN, ESPN2, ESPNU, ESPN 360 or ESPN Regional Television. No other conference enjoys such exposure.”
Big East commissioner Michael Tranghese calls it a “collaborative and wide-ranging effort” by both parties.
“Ten days into the exclusive negotiating period both John and Chuck Gerber basically just looked at me and said, ‘Do you want to make a deal?’ From that point on both of us acted openly and put down in front of each other what we needed to accomplish this. We basically spent the next three months trying to make the deal work,” Tranghese said.
“We arrived at a point where ESPN and ABC are very happy and obviously our members are ecstatic about this," Tranghese said. "For a conference that was dead and buried about three years ago, I think this announcement can put that to rest and we can now focus on what I always considered to be the most important thing which is the games.”
West Virginia coach John Beilein believes the new deal will only increase the Mountaineers’ fan base nation wide.
“One of the things I have learned in my time at West Virginia is that there are Mountaineer fans all over the country, not just the state,” he said. “I think our success the last few years has increased our fan base. Now, television sets will be on all across the country for fans to watch their favorite teams. With this new agreement, having every league game on television is absolutely tremendous for the exposure of our team and the Big East.”
In addition to men’s basketball and football, ESPN guarantees the Big East an average of 11 regular season women’s basketball games per year with 15 regular-season appearances on ESPNU with the addition of an eight-week women’s basketball game of the week package on Saturdays to be carried by ESPN Regional. The Big East is now the only conference in the country with a weekend women’s basketball game of the week package.
ESPN or ESPN2 will continue to televise the Big East women’s basketball championship game with the semifinal match-ups airing on either ESPN, ESPN2 or ESPNU. ESPNU has the exclusive right to televise all additional women’s basketball tournament games with ESPN Regional picking up any games ESPNU doesn't carry.
“(This deal) provides exposure to our membership beyond anything that we’ve ever had before and we’re obviously excited about it,” Tranghese said.
Financial terms of the agreement were not released. The announcement was made at the ESPN Zone in New York City.
