Small schools find cable TV and the Web offer new ways to get their games -- and names -- out there
By JOE FLINT Wall Street Journal March 13, 2006; Page R10 http://online.wsj.com/article/SB114193129931493909.html?mod=technology_main_promo_left Stephanie Boeke, a forward on Butler University's Bulldogs, is used to getting critiqued by her older brother Ben. He watches her games and sends her emails offering tips on her shooting style. But this season, Ben checked out his sister's moves not from the stands, nor even from the family's living room in Minster, Ohio. He did it from Iraq, where he was facility manager at the Balad Air Force Base Medical Center. Butler broadcasts, or "streams," its games over the Web, so Senior Airman Boeke could watch his sister's games on one of the center's computers. "You would forget where you were, which was nice, being in Iraq," says Senior Airman Boeke, who was recently reassigned to Wright Patterson Air Force Base in Ohio. Except for one time when a sandstorm wreaked havoc on the signal, the streaming picture "was amazing, like watching on TV." Small schools like Butler have long struggled to get their sports programs national exposure. But over the past few years, these colleges have gotten a number of new venues to showcase their games. Cable sports channels are booming, and the new networks are hungry for games to fill their schedule. Now the Web allows any school to get its athletics program before a nationwide -- even global -- audience. 'The Right People' Schools hope that bolstering their presence will help them recruit new talent and reach out to alumni -- and get the attention of league decision makers. "One of the things we're all after is to get out from underneath the label of small school or small conference," says Jonathan LeCrone, commissioner of the NCAA's Division I Horizon League, which includes Butler and other small Midwestern schools. "We need to make sure the right people see us, the people who make decisions on tournaments," says Doug Fullerton, commissioner of the NCAA's Division I Big Sky Conference, made up of smaller schools throughout the West. That means getting "your game up to where people can watch it." For many smaller schools, that means cable. As the sports-television marketplace becomes more competitive, midlevel and smaller colleges are finding a national market for their games that wasn't there in years past. From Hoops to Frisbee Walt Disney Co.'s ESPN, for instance, has lots of channels that need content, including the recently launched ESPNU, which is devoted solely to college sports. CBS Corp.'s cable channel College Sports Television (CSTV) is also in that arena. It carries not just lower-tier basketball and football games but all sorts of sports that just 10 years ago would have never been seen beyond their field of play, such as Ultimate Frisbee. News Corp.'s Fox Sports cable arm is also beefing up its presence. "It helps the mid-majors and those lower on the food chain in terms of national stature," says Burke Magnus, vice president and general manager of ESPNU. "There are teams that are very good but no one knew about them, and every March they pop up and win a game or two in the tournament and people wonder who in the heck is Southern Illinois." But cable deals aren't always an ideal arrangement for schools. Despite the exposure, for instance, the colleges aren't getting rich from them. Typically, says ESPN's Mr. Magnus, ESPN pays the production costs, "but we're not in the business of really paying huge rights fees, nor do they expect it." Indeed, while major college sports conferences get compensated by cable and broadcast networks for the rights to their games, smaller conferences often pay to get on television. In some cases, networks don't even cover production costs. "Over the last five years, [the league] spent between $300,000 and $400,000 to produce television events, and for that we got about 15 events a year," says Mr. LeCrone of the Horizon League. "To buy that kind of exposure was really expensive." A Smaller Screen Streaming can offer schools a much cheaper alternative. An average game might cost anywhere from $200 to $1,000 to stream, depending on how many people click on the event (the more people who watch, the more bandwidth they use, so the cost rises). So, for the cost of getting 15 games on cable, Mr. LeCrone says, the league can show 144 games on the Web "that anybody in the world can see." Moreover, streaming actually brings in revenue. Typically, someone who wants to watch a school's games online pays a fee of $7.95 a month. Revenue is usually split down the middle between the company providing the streaming and the school or conference, depending on the deal. (Viewers can also buy a package that lets them watch a bunch of different schools' games for a reduced price.) Scheduling is another big advantage of streaming. The Horizon League has a television deal with ESPNU, but sometimes it must schedule games at odd hours, such as 11 a.m., depending on the time slots the network has available. The network "doesn't always have programming slots to accommodate our league," Mr. LeCrone says. So "we have to find other ways." There are a handful of companies that provide streaming services to schools. Both ESPN and CSTV, for instance, are rapidly expanding into the field. CSTV operates about 250 official college sites, most of which offer sports streams. "For the schools, it provides a new revenue stream," says Brian Bedol, a co-founder of CSTV. Putting games online also creates "product for fans and alumni and a new source of communication for the schools." XOS Technologies Inc., which provides software and computer products for both professional and college sports teams, also provides streaming services for about 100 smaller schools. "For a lot of these conferences, their television deals are money losers, so we help them recoup some revenue and content," says Randy Eccker, a co-founder and executive vice president of XOS, based in Sanford, Fla. Another streaming player is New Tier Communications, which also creates software for sports organizations. Todd Merkow, a partner in New Tier and a former Fox Sports executive, says the Scottsdale, Ariz., firm hopes to be providing streaming services for 10 teams by the end of the year. Serving a Niche To be sure, streaming is still in its infancy. The audiences are small, sometimes tiny. Mr. Bedol says some games draw as few as 300 to 500 streams, while a big one might be 20,000 streams. "We don't look at a couple hundred streams as bad," says Mr. Bedol. "We're serving a passion." And the viewing experience, the Horizon League's Mr. LeCrone concedes, isn't CBS. Often, the games are filmed with a bare-bones camera setup, the kind that some teams use to show highlights on the scoreboard at the game. Still, for all the rough edges, "it's a really good viewing experience," Mr. LeCrone says, adding that he spends most nights glued to his computer watching league games. Despite the current limited audience, schools think streaming has the potential to be a valuable tool for keeping alumni close and landing talented recruits. "We've used it very strongly as a recruiting tool since the beginning of the summer," says Jerry Slocum, head coach of the Youngstown State men's basketball team in Ohio. "Distance from home is a major factor when you are recruiting." Streaming certainly made a difference for Rhonda Hensley. Her son, Will, is a forward on the Northern Arizona University basketball team -- almost a 2,000-mile round trip from his Midlothian, Texas, home. While going far away to play basketball wasn't an issue for her son, she had rarely missed any of his games up to that point. "That was one of the momma questions I asked on our official visit," Ms. Hensley says. "I am a single mom, I can't go there." Since Northern Arizona streams its games, Ms. Hensley can catch all of her son's games for $7.95 a month -- even if it means driving 30 minutes to her mother's house to use her high-speed Internet line. "It was a big relief," she says. Keeping up with her son "is a very big issue." ================================ George Antunes, Political Science Dept University of Houston; Houston, TX 77204 Voice: 713-743-3923 Fax: 713-743-3927 antunes at uh dot edu Reply with a "Thank you" if you liked this post. _____________________________ MEDIANEWS mailing list [email protected] To unsubscribe send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
