WKU Football: C-USA strikes deal with ESPN, home game times announced

Within minutes of one another on Thursday, Conference USA announced they have struck a deal with ESPN to air games on ESPN+ and the…

Within minutes of one another on Thursday, Conference USA announced they have struck a deal with ESPN to air games on ESPN+ and the Hilltoppers announced start times for each home game during the 2018 season.

According to the conference’s press release, ESPN+ will air around 175 conference games, with the main selling points as follows:

It’s actually a pretty solid partnership that works in tandem with C-USA’s other deals (Facebook and CBS Sports) that will make conference events more readily available to more fans.

If there’s a downfall, it’s not in the deal itself, but in ESPN+’s business model of charging $5 a month for access, regardless of if you have ESPN as part of your cable package (somthing I have but am not happy that I have to pay extra for things that were previously free [i.e. CFL games, cricket matches, etc.]).

The thing that immediately jumped out to me about this deal is how it’ll impact the ability to watch basketball games, which I don’t think will be very much. Having no inside information, I think ESPN+ will be the way to watch away games, and I believe HSSN will still produce games for Fox College Sports (I could be 100% wrong on that, though).

HSSN chimed in on the matter, as much as they could with the deal only just being announced.

So, it could change, but for now like I said, the big difference in basketball will be away games will probably be easier to access through ESPN+, and HSSN/FCS games will be the continued way to watch home contests.

I also love that baseball, softball, soccer and volleyball are included in the deal, but wish all games were instead of just the championships. Maybe one day.

Along with that, the Tops announced an across the board start time of 6:30 p.m. CT for all home football games.

The consistency of when the home games will be played is cool, and it falls into what fans have been wanting for years (11 a.m. games are too early, 2:30 p.m. is bad for competition because you have the marquee games going on elsewhere). Unfortunately, with how little is expected this season, I don’t think the time change will improve attendance, unless the Tops come out red hot to start the year.

Finally, we now know all how all but one game will be broadcast.