SEC wants its own t.v. network

[Guest]

big east network would do very well up in the N.E.  not even as much with football like most of these other conferences depend on...but basketball would be huge...then in the spring its lacross is big up there too.

but my point about the SEC being regional is that it would only be carried by cable companies in the south.  not as many cable households in the south as there are in the midwest.

True, Rezz.  I meant in the SEC, cable companies would have to offer it as part of their basic packages... whereas in the Big Ten, cable companies offer it "a la carte" (usually in a sports package)... there are more households in Big Ten country, but depending on how the networks are offered, the SEC could end up with more subscribers.

[Guest]

One problem with all conferences trying this is many cable providers are flat out tapped on bandwidth.  Government regulation, for better or worse, forces them to continue to carry the analog broadcasts which require roughly 10x what a digital transmission uses and 3x what a HD digital transmission would use. 

will these analog broadcasts be eliminated when they make this "digital tv" switch?

Nope.

Mark Cuban (Owner of Dallas Mavericks, among other companies) has a good post on this topic on his blog:

http://www.blogmaverick.com/2008/04/10/how-to-make-us-broadband-competitive-quickly-and-cheaply/

[Joe]

If you don't think a SEC network would do well nationlly, you need to look at the current TV contracts.

The other 5 BCS conferences are all on ABC, mostly (outside a couple exceptions) regionally broadcast to peak ratings.

The SEC has their own network (CBS) that shows one game nationally, and pulls the same or better ratings.

I'd love to see a BE network for basketball specifically, night in and out you'd get great matchups.

[twillybull]

Wasn't there a story about how the Big East (due to the cities each school is located in) has one of the highest audience potential for ratings / shares?  I remember reading something about this with the conference shakeup / re-alignment. 

[80mins]

Wasn't there a story about how the Big East (due to the cities each school is located in) has one of the highest audience potential for ratings / shares?  I remember reading something about this with the conference shakeup / re-alignment.   

I'd be surprised if that weren't the case. 3 schools are in NY metro alone, plus DePaul in Chicago (with a strong ND presence there as well), Nova in Philly, Georgetown in DC, all of which are top 10 in metro area populations in the US. And Tampa, Pittsburgh, and Cincy are no slouches either--all top 25.

[sdgukhsdgl]

Wasn't there a story about how the Big East (due to the cities each school is located in) has one of the highest audience potential for ratings / shares?  I remember reading something about this with the conference shakeup / re-alignment. 

I'd be surprised if that weren't the case. 3 schools are in NY metro alone, plus DePaul in Chicago (with a strong ND presence there as well), Nova in Philly, Georgetown in DC, all of which are top 10 in metro area populations in the US. And Tampa, Pittsburgh, and Cincy are no slouches either--all top 25.

but I don't know that you could say that any of those schools are the top draw in that city, some not even one of the top draws...