Roots Announces Big Sky Conference TV Schedule

[Uncle Rico's Clan]

http://www.bigskyconf.com/news/2012/4/10/FB_0410125627.aspx


SEATTLE, WA (April 10, 2012) – DIRECTV Sports Networks and the Big Sky Conference have announced the telecast schedule for the upcoming 2012 football season with a total of 12 games to be televised on the ROOT SPORTS branded regional sports networks. The three ROOT SPORTS networks reach more than 8.7 million viewers across 18 states, including Oregon, Washington, Montana, Idaho, Utah and Colorado that are home to most Big Sky institutions.

It looks like every game Roots will broadcast has either Montana or msu playing.

[ursus arctos horribilis]

Hope ya don't mind Rico but I did a slight edit there and put a small fraction of the article in to let people have a sampling to go read the rest.

Good little piece of info. there and thanks for posting it up. Gonna be sweet to have those games available like that. They did go state of Montana heavy but a lot of good repping around the conference there. They've gotta give themselves a chance at a good audience to get off on the right foot.

[Uncle Rico's Clan]

No problem, i need to start doing that more often when I post.

[darell1976]

xsmileyclapxxsmileyclapxxsmileyclapxxsmileyclapx

[slostang]

I think I will drop Direct TV.

[HailSzczur]

So this is only a Direct TV station? I'm not familiar with the network.

[slostang]

It is going to look bad for Direct TV/Root TV when the only Big Sky team that they did not air in 2012 turns out to be the Big Sky Champions. I am not saying.....I am just saying. :)

[bojeta]

I think I will drop Direct TV.

I wonder if the lack of Cal Poly games is due to the contract with KSBY. I believe KSBY will be televising all home games. Is that right?

[slostang]

I wonder if the lack of Cal Poly games is due to the contract with KSBY. I believe KSBY will be televising all home games. Is that right?

They will air 3 home games.

[kittiekop]

I wonder if the lack of Cal Poly games is due to the contract with KSBY. I believe KSBY will be televising all home games. Is that right?

Can't be because of a local broadcast contract. The contract with Root Sports is with the conference for broadcast rights to conference games. Any games Root doesn't claim can then be picked up by others. But Root has first right to all BSC games.

I think this is purely about revenue and exposure. They picked up games with UM & MSU - the conference leaders in attendance - thus following. It'll provide conference exposure, but still caters to the conference "big dogs". I think the Poly snub has everything to do with Root not having an exposure in California.

[darell1976]

Why does all the games have to be with Montana or Montana State? Why not Cal Poly at UND or a Sac State-UC Davis game? Also UND has an agreement with Fox College Sports does this interfere with this? Will FCS show other UND games since only Montana at UND is the only one on Roots?

[ursus arctos horribilis]

Can't be because of a local broadcast contract. The contract with Root Sports is with the conference for broadcast rights to conference games. Any games Root doesn't claim can then be picked up by others. But Root has first right to all BSC games.

I think this is purely about revenue and exposure. They picked up games with UM & MSU - the conference leaders in attendance - thus following. It'll provide conference exposure, but still caters to the conference "big dogs". I think the Poly snub has everything to do with Root not having an exposure in California.

that was exactly my thought as well. I'm sure they would love to have exposure in CA but just do not at this time.

[ursus arctos horribilis]

Why does all the games have to be with Montana or Montana State? Why not Cal Poly at UND or a Sac State-UC Davis game? Also UND has an agreement with Fox College Sports does this interfere with this? Will FCS show other UND games since only Montana at UND is the only one on Roots?

darell, this is the conference contract. Roots has 1st dibs. After that any contract the individual teams have come into play.

Montana and Montana State have long been sort of screwed by the BSC as far as the TV deals go. I don't know if it has changed but when Montana has it's own local station bid on an away game to televise it for the Montana fans it costs a good chunk of change. It wouldn't even happen in the first place if it weren't for the local station broadcasting it. All that said the home team gets the lion share of the contract instead of Montana. It's something like 75-80% cut for the home team.

Any conference member wanting to gripe should look at the fact that this is, and always will be about cashflow and Montana & Motnana State are the big earners at this point. Your teams as well as Roots and the conference will benefit from this.

[Uncle Rico's Clan]

Can't be because of a local broadcast contract. The contract with Root Sports is with the conference for broadcast rights to conference games. Any games Root doesn't claim can then be picked up by others. But Root has first right to all BSC games.

I think this is purely about revenue and exposure. They picked up games with UM & MSU - the conference leaders in attendance - thus following. It'll provide conference exposure, but still caters to the conference "big dogs". I think the Poly snub has everything to do with Root not having an exposure in California.

Your post made me realize something about the way Root did the scheduling. At first I was a bit surprised about how many of the games being broadcast had Montana or msu on the road, considering the stadiums for these two schools would look great on TV. Then I realized, its a great way to increase viewership, in theory, showing a Griz game, when they are on the road will put about 25,000 more people in front of the TV.

[LakesBison]

All Montana/Montana St games is fine with the rest of us public football viewers, we've never heard of any other teams in that conference way up there.

[darell1976]

All Montana/Montana St games is fine with the rest of us public football viewers, we've never heard of any other teams in that conference way up there.

I hope you don't mean NDSU fans? You, South Dakota, and South Dakota State were in the same conference with 5 of the 13 BSC teams, plus everyone knows about Eastern Washington and its red turf. So thats almost half the Big Sky right there.

[ursus arctos horribilis]

I hope you don't mean NDSU fans? You, South Dakota, and South Dakota State were in the same conference with 5 of the 13 BSC teams, plus everyone knows about Eastern Washington and its red turf. So thats almost half the Big Sky right there.

oh darell, how do you bite on that?xeyebrowx

[darell1976]

oh darell, how do you bite on that?xeyebrowx

xdohx

[citdog]

http://s3.amazonaws.com/rapgenius/kunta-kinte-getting-whipped.jpg

[darell1976]

http://s3.amazonaws.com/rapgenius/kunta-kinte-getting-whipped.jpg

Good movie Citdog! But its Root Sports not Roots like the movie.xlolx

[JALMOND]

Surprised they couldn't pick up the Portland State/Washington game, especially with them based in Seattle. They carried the EWU/Washington game last year when they were FOX. Obviously, you need "MONTANA" somewhere in your name in order to get TV coverage.

[ursus arctos horribilis]

Surprised they couldn't pick up the Portland State/Washington game, especially with them based in Seattle. They carried the EWU/Washington game last year when they were FOX. Obviously, you need "MONTANA" somewhere in your name in order to get TV coverage.

I can't believe you need to be told this JA but that is not a BSC game. This is the BSC contract and thus games we are looking at here.

You can all bitch about it if you want but there has been a whole lot more TV coverage for a long peiod of time because of the demand to see Montana/Montana State on TV and that at times has given you the opportunity to see your team on TV when there is no way in hell you would have without these two teams fans making it possible.

[Hammerhead]

It should be no surprise that one of the Montana schools is playing in every game and EWU is the only other school in 2 from last year's average home attendance numbers.

Montana 24,878
Montana St. 17,071
Eastern Wash. 8,899

Big Sky average 11,128

[Screamin_Eagle174]

I wonder if UM and MSU's petitioning to get their playoff games aired last year had anything to with this. I also wonder if SCROOTS will then also air all home BSC playoff games this year, not just the Montanas. xcoffeex

[BearIt]

I wonder if UM and MSU's petitioning to get their playoff games aired last year had anything to with this. I also wonder if SCROOTS will then also air all home BSC playoff games this year, not just the Montanas. xcoffeex

Montana's petition was with ESPN and not with the BSC. It had nothing to do with it.

Perhaps this has to do with Roots trying to limit the competition that want to air BSC games. The only real real competitor for the BSC games are KPAX (UM games) and Max Media (MSU). Roots has essentially made it so they are the only network that is airing any BSC games by showing the majority of the MSU and Montana games. It will be interesting to see if KPAX and Max Media pick up the other games. It might not be worth their while for only a few games.

What I think it has to do with is viewership. They want viewers and the only way to ensure that will happen is by showing the Montana and MSU games. If it wasn't for UM and MSU there would be no TV deal and the conference schools would have to continue paying for Big Sky TV. This way they don't pay and they get to collect a check . I'm sure Roots would be happy to divide the conference games up evenly, but then the conference would have to pay to make it worth it.xcoffeex

FWIW... I would be pissed if I was a fan of any other Big Sky school, but it's business. I'm sure Fans of WSU, Vanderbilt, Northwestern and Iowa State aren't happy with the number of game they get on TV compared to their conference mates either.