southpaw

And that stinks because it should be available in more places. People who want to watch the games in areas like those need to call their cable companies and request the channel be added specifically because of Sioux hockey. Bemidji understands the importance and would be more likely to add it because of that reason. But if we're talking about national exposure, 98 > 50.

bigskyvikes for president!

Aren't we talking national exposure? Or is it just Sprig exposure now? FCS is available in 50 million homes. CBSSN (IN HD!) is available in 98 million homes.

Not all national TV is made the same. Just because you're on a national channel like FCS doesn't mean you're getting the same national exposure as an HD channel that is easier to access. There is a massive difference in the number of viewers for a game on CBSSN vs a game on FCS. There is a massive difference in exposure for a university playing on the road versus playing at home. CBSSN isn't going to show WMU's arena if it's a game at the Ralph. They're going to focus more on the home team because that's where the cameras are at. The number of games may be minimal but the national exposure is overwhelmingly better for the 7 schools who magically happen to be the 7 schools that voted yes.

I don't know a lot of specifics on what Notre Dame's demands were, I just know they involved a lot more than just TV rights. And once you start making exceptions for one school, where do you draw the line? Per you second paragraph... UND Broadcasting would have been better with Notre Dame in the league. There is a lot more that goes into happiness in a conference than just TV rights. UND had the TV rights it wanted in the WCHA but left the conference because there were a lot of other issues. Games on FCS has ALWAYS been an added bonus. I agree with you that the games should be on FCS and I'm disappointed they're not. I just understand the reasoning behind the conference (5 original schools, like you said) deciding to go with CBSSN. For total number of games, if you include UND's 17 home conference games plus Notre Dame's 12 home games, it is already more than the CBSSN deal. That's great for UND and Notre Dame but looking at how the NBCSN deal breaks down for Hockey East, you see it's not so great for most of the conference: ND: 12 home BU: 1 home, 3 road Umass: 1 home, 3 road Northeastern: 3 road Maine: 1 home, 2 road BC: 1 home, 0 road Providence: 0 games UMass Lowell: 0 games Merrimack: 0 games Vermont: 0 games The most successful team in NCAA hockey over the past 15 years has one game on national TV.

Especially since the goal of all 7 schools is to screw over UND as much as possible! I bet all of the schools voted to take UND's cut of the CBSSN contract.

Thank you for proving my point. All but UNO have at least the same number of games with the contract. Games on CBSSN are better produced, HD broadcasts available on an easier channel for people to get. They also aren't all road games for the 7 schools. You can assume conspiracy against UND but your own numbers show the contract is beneficial to a majority of schools in the conference. This also doesn't include the three playoff games that would not be aired on FCS.

Any sport will take a backseat to one playing in a $100 million arena but that doesn't mean there isn't support for the program. Has Mussman been paid similar to other FCS programs? No but he didn't start as an FCS coach. Faison has shown he is willing to pay someone when they start as a D1/FCS coach. See Brewster vs Jones for that comparison. Or see how much Idalski makes, although part of that has to do with Title IX. A new IPF, an indoor stadium, new football offices, new jerseys, etc tells me that UND is willing to give football the support it needs, especially in hiring a new coach. I hope they pay someone in the $175k range with bonuses based on accomplishments and ticket sales.

I think that's one of the reasons UND isn't in the Summit. They get conference games against the Big Sky schools and scheduling non-conference games is pretty simple with NDSU, SDSU, USD and UNO just down the road. It's actually a pretty nice benefit for UND to not be in the same league.

I believe they've lost 4 of their 5 Saturday night games by one goal. They haven't showed up well in the first game of a series all year but Coach Corbett has them making adjustments.

I'm surprised you know anything about something with the world English in it

They did. Compared to Mankato, Tech and Anchorage UND was considered one of the big schools. Compared to Minnesota, it was clear UND was considered lower. In the NCHC, UND isn't a big school or a little school. They are on similar footing as all of the other schools.

There are three tiers of sports broadcasting rights. Tier one is usually for national networks or conference networks like the Big Ten or NBC sports network. Once the tier one rights have either been taken or passed over then it goes on to tier 2 rights. Those go to regional networks like Fox Sports north. Tier 3 rights are usually the Internet feed which is sold to Neulion for Und. The NCHC deal states that all tier one rights go to CBS sports network. The Big Ten network chooses which tier 1 rights it wants to keep and allows the schools to sign contracts for any available games.

It's generally 20% of a market at most. Some sports-crazed cities, like Boston, are obviously going to be higher. But overall it is about 20%. With HD exploding and FCS only offering a limited HD channel it makes FCS even less-watched than before. People don't accidentally turn to an SD FCS channel anymore. UND is much more likely to get a casual viewer and expand national presence via CBSSN than FCS because of number of viewers. I do know the numbers for Colorado Springs. There are 78,000 Comcast subscribers in town and only 12,000 homes have the sports package. This is in a town of 450,000 people. FCS can sell ad space over UND games (and any other games) that they air. They actually do sell ad space for some of the Big12 football games they carry. FCS is a subsidiary of Fox Sports and they have an agreement to show Big12 and PAC-10 football and basketball. FCS picks up some games and they advertise because there are enough viewers to justify it.

The way cable and satellite agreements are setup. Cable can't carry out-of-region regional networks. For example: Comcast is a cable company that covers much of the U.S. However, every city that has Comcast has an intergovernmental agreement with the LOCAL Comcast office. In the FCC's eyes, there is no national cable company. It's all local cable companies. While that may be bad for some viewers, it's a very, very good thing for the cities themselves. They receive significantly more funding from the cable companies from those franchise agreements than they would if it was a national cable company. Part of that local agreement is that they only carry in-region channels. Satellite only has to pay cities for using their phone lines, which is significantly cheaper than cable wiring throughout the city. Satellite is considered a national company in the FCC's eyes, just like Sirius/XM is different than local radio stations. Satellite is able to carry all of the channels because it doesn't have to abide by the local cable company rules. The cities don't get as much money but the viewers get more options. Realize TV is really only 60 years old and the sports boom has only happened over the last 15 years. Things are evolving but there are a lot of rules in place that are there for a reason, although they may be outdated. Regardless, the FCC isn't going to change things soon.

Not everyone is at the bar before noon like you Because I work in college sports broadcasting. I can't bring a printed out report with specific numbers but it's pretty easy to infer based on numbers that have been released in the past. Games carried on NBCSN, a channel that is available on a standard package on most TVs throughout the US, only average 68,000 viewers last year. Those numbers were significantly lower for teams in the west regardless of how good of a matchup it would be. It has been shown that only a fraction of people who purchase cable or satellite also get the sports package that allows them to get channels like FCS. There is much more that goes into determining the actual viewers but that's a simple explanation based off one network. Additionally, despite having the entire schedule set for last year FCS did not have advertising during UND hockey games. They aired internal promotions which actually cost the network money to air. If UND (or any college hockey) was a money-maker for FCS they would be able to sell even ridiculously cheap advertising just to recover some of the costs. To them (and they know the actual numbers) it wasn't worth it to advertise.

When television companies are created they must declare either regional or national status. If a company like ROOT is going to focus solely on Colorado/Rocky Mountain sports then it's going to want to designate itself as regional. That makes it more likely it will be on a standard cable package, which it is. If it decides it wants to be national, then it will likely be placed on a sports tier in a digital package, which FCS is on most cable systems.

And that's where I believe people underestimate the benefits of this contract. Had NBCSN gone to the NCHC with Notre Dame I would have fully expected Hockey East or the ECAC to sign the exclusivity agreement with CBSSN. In CBS you have a national network that has shown has willingness and a desire to broadcast college hockey. For Hockey East, the exclusivity clause would have meant 16 games combined throughout the league would not have been able to be aired on FCS (12)or NBCSN (4) this year. That's it. The benefits of having 18 games on CBSSN vs 16 on FCS/NBCSN are definitely worth it. FCS broadcasts often don't hit 10,000 viewers. So to trade 18 CBSSN games for those 4 NBCSN games is a great deal, regardless of any exclusivity clause. Only two schools in all of college hockey would suffer from an exclusive contract like the one with CBSSN. That is UND and Notre Dame. There are no other schools in a similar situation to UND. 57 of 59 schools likely would have voted in favor of this deal. Edit: The Big10 schools couldn't accept a deal like this if they were in the B10 conference because the B10 network is considered a national network and the conference wouldn't allow that. So 51 of 59 schools would be in favor of the contract.

I agee that CBS should be showing NCHC conference games when available. However, committing to broadcast 18 games that are all west of the Mississippi is an investment. The only game on the CBS schedule that I have an issue with is RIT vs Niagara. CBSSN has a history of broadcasting at least one of the Air Force/Army games every year for the last 4-5 years at least. I am ok with them continuing that tradition. However, at least one of the games this weekend should have been either UND/UMD or DU/WMU instead of two non-conference games.

FCS is not considered a regional network. Since cable companies throughout the U.S. can carry FCS, similar to NHL network, CBSSN, and etc it is considered a national network. Don't be confused by the FCS Pacific/Central/Atlantic names. They're just names. ESPN could have gone with ESPN-West Coast instead of ESPN 2 but that wouldn't make it a regional network. Midco can be lumped in with all the Fox Sports regionals, like Root, Fox Sports North, etc. Living in Colorado, I can't get Midco on cable. Just like I can't get Fox Sports North. Those are dedicated regional channels because they're not available nationally on CABLE.

I don't like the NCHC/CBSSN TV deal from a UND fan side of things. I can't watch the games on FCS. I have to stream everything now, just like everyone else. The CBSSN deal sucks for UND, no way around it. However, it is a great deal for the league. Other than the Big 10 network, it is the best TV deal in college hockey. Does the exclusivity clause negatively affect the conference? Absolutely, but it's not so significant that it should have derailed the contract. 7 schools in the league now have more games broadcasted to more people than they did last year. That's a great thing for the league. We won't have more specific numbers until after the season is over however I would not be surprised to see that with the CBSSN deal, all 8 schools in the league had more viewers combined than all 8 of the schools did last year. And that includes UND on FCS.

Because Dish and DirecTV have decided that there are enough people who watch Root that they will carry that channel nationally. At this point, Dish and DirecTV do not feel there are enough viewers to justify carrying Midco. That could change (and hopefully it does) as it would mean Midco has it's own dedicated channel on satellite. Midco is exactly the same as Root in that it is a regional network. The main difference is Root is an established channel while Midco is only a few years old. Also, Root reaches to millions of people just in Denver, not to mention the rest of the Rocky Mountain viewing area.

It's fine to disagree. It's idiotic to assume that the driving force behind a decision made by 7 other schools in a brand new conference was to screw over UND. But please, enlighten me with more about how DU's regional broadcast schedule is smaller this year. I'd love to hear your expertise.

Wow, some UND fans are delusional about how important UND really is in the scheme of things. A new arena, unprecedented TV coverage and some good teams have made fans spoiled over the last 15 years. It's like UND hockey is God and if somebody else doesn't see it, then they are either wrong or trying to screw UND over. How much "smaller" has DU's regional broadcasts been this year? They have 7 games on Root/Altitude this year. THE EXACT SAME NUMBER AS LAST YEAR! Clearly, all of those "lost games" had to do with the NCHC/CBSSN deal. For the rest of the schools that voted for this? They get more games on national TV than they did last year. Why are they regretting the decision? There is no point in responding to your sentence about the other schools trying to screw over UND. That is a truly idiotic statement. Notre Dame's demands were not just TV related. How many UND fans loved the preferential treatment Minnesota got in the league? It would have been significantly worse had the NCHC caved to Notre Dame's demands. CBSSN likely would not have offered a teleivision package without the exclusivity clause. They had several other leagues they could go to and so they had bargaining power over the NCHC. People vastly overestimate the number of people watching Sioux hockey on FCS. There are not millions of people tuning in each weekend to watch UND play. There is a reason UND and Midco were not getting any funding for broadcasting those games on FCS. There's a reason FCS only ran promos and no actual commercials during UND hockey broadcasts. You can't sell advertising to something that isn't going to be watched by a lot of people. Notre Dame and UND would not have received a bulk of that exposure. Notre Dame would have received 90% of the exposure. The vote was never about forcing equality. It was "what is best for my school." For 7 of the 8 schools who weren't on national TV, it was about getting on national tv more. The CBSSN deal does that for those seven schools. That's why they voted yes. How has having 18 games broadcast nationally (more than any other league) squash the league as a whole? Just because UND's games aren't available to the 10,000 people who watched on FCS? Get a clue. UND on FCS does not equal national exposure for the NCHC. League-wide games on CBSSN does. Do you honestly believe this stuff you type? Please take a second and compare the CBS deal (even with UND not on FCS) to any and all AHA and WCHA games aired on TV. You can even combine AHA and the WCHA into one conference to try and boost the numbers a bit. Compare the NCHC national broadcast schedule to that of Hockey East. Outside of Notre Dame, the CBSSN deal wipes the floor with Hockey East's national coverage. The NCHC exists to make sure each school has a vote in the process. Had the NCHC formed in the early 90's and UND was invited to join, would you be cool with UND having a lesser voice because hockey wasn't as popular? I imagine you were one of the people screaming for Minnesota and Wisconsin hockey to have more power in the WCHA because they're bigger schools with more followers than UND. You wouldn't want UND to be considered second fiddle in the WCHA so why do you expect other schools to feel that way in the NCHC?

The bolded part is the only part that I disagree with. With Notre Dame in the NCHC one would naturally assume the NBCSN contract would come with it and bring lots of TV coverage (non-exclusive) to the NCHC. However, NBCSN instead renewed their contract with Hockey East. That contract consists of four non-Notre Dame Hockey East conference games all season. The number of HE games aired on NBCSN over the next TWO YEARS is capped at 12... total. Not 12 a year, 12 total. NBCSN doesn't care about airing college Hockey East games, they care about airing Notre Dame games. And it would have been the same way for the NCHC. People make the NBCSN thing out to be much bigger of a deal than it is. The only benefit of the NBCSN deal is that Hockey East schools can show their games outside of their region.