Once synonymous with the Midwest, the Big Ten will soon have 16 teams spread from New Jersey to California.The conference recently announced a planned addition USC and UCLAwhich gave the conference a lucrative footprint in the Los Angeles media market and increased the value of the deal.
Kevin Warren, the conference’s commissioner since 2020, said he had been thinking about expanding the Big Ten after being interviewed this summer. Warren incorporated the idea of expansion into an early term sheet discussed with the network, if not a specific school, he said.
“What expansion did for us and our fans was really shrinking the United States and shrinking the country,” Warren said in an interview. Noon and Night, and Black He Like Friday, from coast to coast, at special times of the year. ”
All 16 members of the Big Ten will be recipients of the financial windfall, including previous additions Maryland and Rutgers. The conference’s main rival, the SEC, has made moves of its own, with last year’s Added Texas and Oklahoma.
“The ability of the Big Ten and the SEC to generate television revenue has drawn big name brands like USC and Texas to these conferences in a way that wouldn’t make sense without all the money from television. In several lawsuits: “It’s also clear they run the football team like a business, and in doing so, they treat their players like NFL players.”
The move and onslaught to break with the tradition of college sports’ biggest income source, television money, comes as the NCAA faces nationwide lawsuits and legislation challenging its longstanding amateurism rule. Last year, the association We have relaxed some of these restrictions Warren says he’s open to having conversations with players about it I was.
“All these outstanding issues must be put on the table to be legally debated,” he said.
The new deal, beginning in 2023, marks a staggering amount of money to fill the coffers of college sports programs, an evolution that can be traced through the Big Ten.In 1996, the conference signed a then-record contract. His 10-year, $100 million deal with ESPN put nearly every conference game on the network. In 2007, the conference partnered with Fox to launch the Big Ten Network, which over 20 years brought in $2.8 billion in revenue. Pac-12, ACC, and SEC followed Big Ten in launching their own network of brands with varying degrees of success.
The Big Ten and SEC far outperform rival conferences in terms of revenue. The SEC signed a deal with ESPN that he’s worth $3 billion over 10 years. According to Sports Business Journalthe best Saturday games starting in 2024.
Under the new deal, the conference will follow an NFL-like schedule, spanning college football Saturdays across three broadcast networks, each with windows. 3:30 p.m. on CBS. Primetime on NBC. Of note is his ESPN who has been a Big Ten partner for 40 years. Even in a more fragmented media landscape, ESPN remains the country’s leading sports network. Its daily talk line-up facilitates conversations about the sport of the day and holds the right to college football playoffs. For decades, ESPN has been key to bringing the Big Ten to national television.
“We’re a big part of college athletics, especially college football,” Warren said. “We all recognize that it is important for all of us to work together and have a collective voice. Where we stand in the Big Ten, we are shaping the future of college athletics on and off the field. I am confident that I can raise my voice in shaping.
The Big Ten is the latest sports facility to happen and once again proves the value of live sports to both traditional and new media companies. signed by the NFL Deal with four broadcast networks and Amazon Last year, we will pay about $100 billion over 10 years. A new Major League Baseball contract with Fox Sports will value him more than $5 billion over seven years. Last year, the English Premier League doubled the annual value of his US royalties when he re-signed with NBC for $2.7 billion over six years. Live sports continue to be key to retaining cable customers, and streaming platforms want to use them to attract new subscribers. (The Big Ten has also spoken to Amazon.)
Other Big Ten sports, including men’s and women’s basketball, air on Fox and Fox Sports 1. CBS; NBC; and Big Ten Network, in which Fox owns 61% of his stake. And Peacock, NBC’s streaming service. Fox and Fox Sports 1 will continue to show the majority of the conference’s football games.
In 2023, CBS will broadcast seven football games. The network is still tied to the SEC through a contract that requires the conference’s top games to be aired exclusively by CBS at 3:30 p.m.
NBC broadcasts football games 14-16 each season and introduces a program called “Big Ten Saturday Nights.” This reflects the success the network has had with ‘Sunday Night Football’. These three major networks will share the rights to broadcast the Big Ten football title game, with Fox airing the game in 2023, 2025, 2027 and 2029, and CBS (2024, 2028). and NBC (2026) will televise the marquee event. Year.
CBS will broadcast the championship games of both men’s and women’s basketball conference tournaments.
