An Attendee's Thoughts on URI's 2016-2017 TV Coverage
I read somewhere that the Atlantic 10 was real excited about the national coverage that all of its basketball teams would be receiving in the 2016-2017 season. As a pessimist, I love excitement as much as the next person but let's talk about some facts regarding the Atlantic 10's TV coverage for their basketball teams, in particular, let's discuss the coverage of the Rhode Island Rams. As several college basketball experts picked URI to be the Preseason #1 team in the Atlantic 10, everyone got the impression that URI would receive ample national TV coverage. Therefore, let's break down what kind of TV stations would be covering Rhode Island basketball games.
For all home games against terrible non-conference opponents like Dartmouth and Marist, the games were shown on a poopy live stream in which they put the shot clock timer in the right corner of the screen. Given such aforementioned opposition, this is not a critical mistake for a team of Rhody's caliber. However, to this point, URI's second best win of the 2016-2017 season was against the Belmont Bruins, which was on a dookie looking live stream on Black Friday.
Moving onward, in a HUGE game between 2 nationally ranked teams, the Cincinnati Bearcats and the Rhode Island Rams, at the renowned Mohegan Sun Arena, the game was broadcasted on ESPN3. Bruh. Show me the excitement now Atlantic 10. The only coverage that was done right was URI affording themselves the opportunity to play Duke on ESPN, only after defeating Cincy first.
Having the URI-Valparaiso game broadcasted on a Tuesday night is certainly respectable. Following this mid-major battle though, can someone from the A10 enlighten me on how URI-PC went from being broadcasted on ESPNU in 2015 when URI's star player was watching with a torn ACL and then he returns in 2016 and the game is on FS1? Seems a bit odd to me and yes, I know that FS1 broadcasts numerous Big East and Pac 10 games. I also know that ESPNU > FS1. When did ESPNU finally put a URI game on though, you ask? ESPNU broadcasted URI when they played without Hass Martin and Christion Thompson against a Houston Cougars team whose fan base was their own team, their band, and the player's parents. Just a friendly reminder that Houston was the home team, not Rhode Island, yet there were as many Ram fans in attendance as Cougar fans. Also, URI was on ESPNU when they destroyed the St. Louis Billikens in their own arena, 90-56.
In the most recent nationally televised game for the Rhode Island Rams, they played the Dayton Flyers in a thriller at UD Arena on ESPN2. ESPN2? Cool. What's not cool? The A10 is responsible for the scheduling of their conference's basketball games and they chose to have this game be played on a Friday night. A lot of college basketball fans are college students. So, what do you think most college students were doing during the time of this game? I'll leave that up to everyone's personal judgment to determine the social activities they were partaking in. Thus, who was watching from Rhode Island's fan base? Some faithful URI students and people who had a broken TV stuck on ESPN2?
Finally, let's show some love to the CBS Sports Network and NBC Sports Network that will be broadcasting the majority of URI's remaining schedule. Oh wait, I often forget like everyone else that CBS Sports Network and NBC Sports Network exist and that they broadcast URI basketball games.
Oh no, I forgot they're also going to be on ASN for their final 2 games of the season! What channel is ASN? Can Rhode Island residents even get that channel?
In terms of remaining national coverage for the Preseason #1 team in the A10 and the ONLY team in the Atlantic 10 that was ranked (#23 in the AP Poll) to begin the season, URI is set to be on ESPN2 3 more times (at Davidson, vs. Dayton, and vs. VCU). Woo!
Atlantic 10, this is for you and I'm sure you will have plenty in the future...
