What Local TV Stations Broadcast a UNT Game Last Season?

rcade · January 30, 2016

Mean Green Nation needs a local TV station that caters to our fan base and alumni by airing games that aren't on cable networks. Given our alumni presence locally, it's a joke that some of our games don't air anywhere in the DFW TV market, even when American Sports Network aired the game on other TV stations around the U.S.

To avoid this problem in the coming season, we should start contacting local TV stations now to let them know we want to watch UNT games on their station.

Towards that end, does anyone know which local stations aired a UNT game last season? Those are the ones most likely to be persuadable.

Edited January 30, 2016 by rcade

Texas Stranger · January 30, 2016

In the past it's been KTXA/Ch 21 that's picked up some feeds and broadcast them. Historically the Ch 11/ Ch 21 duo has been friendlier to us than all other DFW TV outlets

James329 · January 30, 2016

Ratings: simple as that. Only reason we are on TV at all is because of the CUSA TV deal.

UNT 90 Grad · January 30, 2016

1 minute ago, Texas Stranger said:

In the past it's been KTXA/Ch 21 that's picked up some feeds and broadcast them. Historically the Ch 11/ Ch 21 duo has been friendlier to us than all other DFW TV outlets

Me thinks that wasn't the case last season though.

Monkeypox · January 30, 2016

Yeah but that was WAY in the past. Big West days?

rcade · January 30, 2016

54 minutes ago, James329 said:

Ratings: simple as that. Only reason we are on TV at all is because of the CUSA TV deal.

One of the perks of being in CUSA should be that all our games are on TV locally. I think American Sports Network's deal ensures that every conference game we play has a broadcast. We just need to press the local networks to pick the games up.

UNT 90 Grad · January 30, 2016

3 hours ago, rcade said:

Mean Green Nation needs a local TV station that caters to our fan base and alumni by airing games that aren't on cable networks. Given our alumni presence locally, it's a joke that some of our games don't air anywhere in the DFW TV market, even when American Sports Network aired the game on other TV stations around the U.S.

To avoid this problem in the coming season, we should start contacting local TV stations now to let them know we want to watch UNT games on their station.

Towards that end, does anyone know which local stations aired a UNT game last season? Those are the ones most likely to be persuadable.

I did a little looking, and from what I can tell, there were ZERO local stations that aired UNT games last season. We had games broadcast on ESPNU, the SEC Network, CBS Sports Network, Fox College Sports, and Fox Sports Southwest, none of which were picked up by local stations. We are getting better national coverage, but if you want straight up coverage by local stations (aside from picking up broadcasts from other networks), you'll have to go back the Doug "Doogie" Anderson KTXA 21 days when we were still in the Sun Belt.

The truth is that in recent years in CUSA, the vast majority of our games are already on cable networks. Looking at last season, we only had 2 games that weren't picked up by cable networks (vs. SMU and vs. Portland State). Maybe what you mean't was that we need local TV stations that pick up games that ARE on cable networks. I think, for example, there were times in the 2014 season where KTXA 21 picked up games that were broadcast on the American Sports Network but otherwise wouldn't have been available locally. That's sad when those games can't be seen locally (especially when UNT is on the road).

rcade · January 30, 2016

9 minutes ago, UNT 90 Grad said:

Looking at last season, we only had 2 games that weren't picked up by cable networks (vs. SMU and vs. Portland State).

I only could see the UTSA game because one of their fans put it on Periscope. I had the impression it wasn't televised in DFW.

UNT 90 Grad · January 30, 2016

34 minutes ago, rcade said:

I only could see the UTSA game because one of their fans put it on Periscope. I had the impression it wasn't televised in DFW.

When I say the games were picked up by cable networks, I didn't mean they were necessarily available locally. Sorry for the confusion.

James329 · January 30, 2016

2 hours ago, rcade said:

One of the perks of being in CUSA should be that all our games are on TV locally. I think American Sports Network's deal ensures that every conference game we play has a broadcast. We just need to press the local networks to pick the games up.

We press them with ratings. Most of the the games are on tv. If you don't have basic cable, you probably don't care about college football. I'm not sure what local channel you want them on. Local channels have contracts with other conferences, and they aren't bumping a SEC game on ch 21 for UNT because...ratings.

rcade · January 30, 2016

26 minutes ago, James329 said:

We press them with ratings.

Hard to get ratings for a game that isn't shown.

29 minutes ago, James329 said:

I'm not sure what local channel you want them on.

Any channel that will air them, obviously. Having every UNT game on TV is not an impossibly high standard to meet for an FBS program with 36,000 students and a quarter-million alumni in DFW. We talk here about how the size of the DFW TV market is a plus for UNT. Actually being on TV in that market is kind of a big deal.

James329 · January 30, 2016

21 minutes ago, rcade said:

Hard to get ratings for a game that isn't shown.

Any channel that will air them, obviously. Having every UNT game on TV is not an impossibly high standard to meet for an FBS program with 36,000 students and a quarter-million alumni in DFW. We talk here about how the size of the DFW TV market is a plus for UNT. Actually being on TV in that market is kind of a big deal.

Same can be said for selling out the stadium...yet here we stand...zero sell outs. There are ratings for all of our TV games, if they were big enough to warrant every game on a local channel, it would happen. Does TCU have every game televised locally? If so, when we are Tcu, then we can complain. I get what you're saying, sort of, but there's a pretty simple explanation.

Edited January 31, 2016 by James329

rcade · January 31, 2016

11 minutes ago, James329 said:

Same can be said for selling out the stadium...yet here we stand...zero sell outs. There are ratings for all of our TV games, if they were big enough to warrant every game on a local channel, it would happen.

I didn't expect to get pushback here for discussing how to get all our games on the tube next season. That's a really good use of your time, James.

Waiting around for something to happen on its own isn't generally a successful approach.

Edited January 31, 2016 by rcade

VideoEagle · January 31, 2016

1 hour ago, rcade said:

I didn't expect to get pushback here for discussing how to get all our games on the tube next season. That's a really good use of your time, James.

Waiting around for something to happen on its own isn't generally a successful approach.

I think it's a great idea to push for it. Ratings are NOT the only factor for local coverage of games. But a audience that is know to be loyal can get programming on even with a smaller rating. Plus, some schools either buy all the ads themselves and resell them or do some kind of split with the station of the ads.

I do not know about American Sports Network and how they plan to market being 24/7. It's actually tough to get carriage on cable systems these days and having programming that the local public wants is leverage for them to be on the local cable systems. They would lose that leverage if they made their highest local demand programming available on broadcast. Again, I do NOT know if that is the case but it could explain why things aren't on local free TV. And if this IS the case, fans making their desire to see the games also makes American Sports more attractive to the local cable systems.

Edited January 31, 2016 by VideoEagle

drex · January 31, 2016

I think there is a reason that our basketball is not picked up locally. We simply are not supplying a product that anyone wants to see. Success should turn this thing around, but as stated before, ratings drive the coverage. There were years when we did real well with ratings...our fans are out there, but need a product to support.

FirefightnRick · January 31, 2016

According to RV we play on TV all the time because TV production crews love it that they can set up and be filming in 45 minutes, and that Apogee is the only stadium in the country where that is possible.

Rick

Mike Jackson · February 3, 2016

Not enough regular people care. And the people at the university with actually power surely don't

UNTFan23 · February 3, 2016

3 hours ago, Mike Jackson said:

Not enough regular people care. And the people at the university with actually power surely don't

It costs money to get a game on TV. You either get it done through ad support or you buy the broadcast privilege outright. If we can't get the eyeballs to support buying the ad space, who do you think should pay for the broadcast outright?

Edited February 3, 2016 by UNTFan23

rcade · February 3, 2016

13 hours ago, UNTFan23 said:

It costs money to get a game on TV. You either get it done through ad support or you buy the broadcast privilege outright. If we can't get the eyeballs to support buying the ad space, who do you think should pay for the broadcast outright?

I don't see why you'd conclude that the only way UNT could get on TV locally is if we paid for it. American Sports Network has a CUSA contract for a reason -- the network makes money showing the conference's games. They'd eagerly partner with a TV station in DFW to show a game with a DFW team.

American Sports Network is broadcasting a UNT basketball game tomorrow on stations around the U.S., but none of them are in DFW. If it makes financial sense for those other stations around the U.S. to carry a UNT game, there might be a station in DFW that could make money on it too.

The pessimism here about finding a TV station to show our games is premature. We don't know what local station managers would say if enough UNT alumni and students lobbied them to pick up games.

UNTFan23 · February 3, 2016

1 minute ago, rcade said:

I don't see why you'd conclude that the only way UNT could get on TV locally is if we paid for it. American Sports Network has a CUSA contract for a reason -- the network makes money showing the conference's games. They'd eagerly partner with a TV station in DFW to show a game with a DFW team.

American Sports Network is broadcasting a UNT basketball game tomorrow on stations around the U.S., but none of them are in DFW. If it makes financial sense for those other stations around the U.S. to carry a UNT game, there might be a station in DFW that could make money on it too.

The pessimism here about finding a TV station to show our games is premature. We don't know what local station managers would say if enough UNT alumni and students lobbied them to pick up games.

KTXA 21 has shown games locally before, in fact at least one this season. It would be up to them whether they would want to carry ASN broadcasts featuring our games.

I guess what it comes down to is which would they make more money broadcasting -- what they currently would have scheduled for that time slot or the NT basketball game tomorrow.

rcade · February 3, 2016

I've sent an email to find out who makes sports programming decisions for KTXA. If I get a response I'll post it here.

VideoEagle · February 3, 2016

According to the American Sports Network website, the local affiliate is KTXD channel 47. Here's the link to their schedule. If the game is listed as "available," type in your zip code at the top left and a box in the top right lists the local broadcast channels carrying the game. Not all games are available and the Southern Miss game isn't listed for our area. But the La Tech game on Saturday IS listed as on channel 47. I look at the KTXD schedule and see "paid programing" listed at that time on their schedule, at least for 47.1 KTXD has several sub channels. I did notice some of the ASN games are listed in other markets as being on subchannels but they don't mention a subchannel for DFW. KTXD 47.1 DOES list the UTSA vs Marshal game at 1.