One day after ESPN announced its media rights deal with the
"old" Big East, Fox Sports on Tuesday announced its expected rights
agreement with the "new" Big East.
The 12-year agreement begins with the 2013-14 academic year.
Financial terms were not disclosed.
The agreement grants Fox Sports rights to all
conference-controlled men's basketball games, select rights to women's
basketball, all Olympic sports and extensive rights for highlights and to
produce ancillary programming.
The primary outlet will be the recently-announced national
cable sports network Fox Sports 1, which will show over 100 hours of Big East
men's basketball games, including the entire Big East Tournament, which will
continue to be held at New York's Madison Square Garden. Also included in the
agreement is a full slate of "TV Everywhere" rights on FoxSports.com
and FOX Sports Go, the mobile offering that will launch alongside with FS1 in
August.
With the agreement, Fox Sports now carries media rights
associated with five major college conferences: Big East, Big Ten, Big 12,
Pac-12 and Conference USA.
"We applaud all the Big East schools for taking
responsibility for their own destiny and forming what is clearly one of the top
college basketball leagues in the country," said Randy Freer, Fox Sports
copresident and COO. "The quality of the competition is
obvious. Five teams who will play in the renewed Big East next season are
playing in this year's NCAA tournament, and seven qualified for postseason play
overall. We're extremely proud and fortunate to offer college basketball
of this caliber on FS1 next season and for many seasons to come."
The new Big East conference features the "Catholic
7" schools that broke away from the conference earlier this month. The
seven schools will keep the "Big East" moniker, with the
"old" conference undergoing a name change. The new Big East will
feature those seven schools and add Xavier, Butler and Creighton.
"Today we relaunch the Big East," said
Father Dennis Holtschneider, president of DePaul University, during the
announcement held in New York Tuesday morning.
