SEC, Razorback coverage expanding … big time

This time last year, sports fans everywhere were talking about the insanely huge, 15-year deal that ESPN signed with the Southeastern Conference to televise football and men’s and women’s basketball games. The $2 billion deal gave ESPN the rights to every SEC home football game not already on the network package and added a second and third night of SEC basketball on ESPN/ESPN2 every week. It also gave ABC the rights to two nationally televised regular season basketball games as well as SEC tourney semifinals and championship game coverage.

If all that sounds too complicated, it’s because it is. With 5,500 SEC events in their hands, even ESPN can’t handle all those games. Last week, it sold off a handful of them to a competitor in Fox Sports Net (FSN).

Add all of that to last August’s 15-year CBS contract renewal and come this season, it’ll seem like the SEC is the only conference in the country.

For Hog fans, this is great news. As Brandon Marcello noted a few days ago, “the Razorbacks will never be further than a click of your remote control. Every game this fall, including the trip to Dallas to face Texas A&M, will be on TV.”

But that’s not all…

According to ArkansasRazorbacks.com, UA radio coverage is also getting ramped up this year with every single football and basketball game being aired on a 50-plus network of stations that blanket the entire state of Arkansas.

Also, the brand new “Bobby Petrino Live” radio show will be broadcast live from The Catfish Hole (!) every Wednesday night from 7pm-8pm. And yes, John Pelphrey’s getting one, too.

Finally, the football pre-game coverage which was previously 90 minutes long will be expanded to three friggin hours. Three hours! Three!

With all the changes that have come to the UA athletic program over the course of the last couple of years, it’s getting hard to recognize things around here. I mean that, of course, in a good way. A really good way.

And who knows what’s coming tomorrow?

2009-10 Fayetteville Razorback affiliate list (as of July 16, 2009)