[Farm93]

The P12's experiment with a 9 am kickoff was viewed favorably by Fox. No more are planned for this year, but we can expect more 9 am games next year.

Michael Mulvihill is FOX Sports EVP / Head of Strategy.

[twitter]https://twitter.com/mulvihill79/status/1325515934128242688[/twitter]

I dropped by the 9 am USC-ASU game last Saturday. One of the commentators suggested that it would be good for the Pac-12 to get more appreciation in the rest of the country, by being on TV when most of the country is watching. In context, re was referring to rankings, playoffs, and Voldemort (oops ... that flashy trophy awarded to the best player at the end of the regular season).

Cute logic, but nah...

There is an opportunity cost in play here.    There are a number of conferences that Fox can use to fill the Noon (Eastern) time slot.   Some of those conferences could get close to the USC-ASU ratings level and would not need to feature 2 different top 10 TV markets.

There are no other programs that will allow their players to start a game in the 11PM (Eastern) time slot, and therefore using precious potential 11PM (Eastern) content at Noon (Eastern) is not the optimal allocation.

It was a fun experiment because there are no fans in the stands this year, but we won't see it again at least not for conference games.   In early September when all 12 teams host non-conference games we might see Colorado or Utah get a 10AM (local time) game on the Pac-12 Network if their opponent is an FCS team.

[Farm93]

The P12's experiment with a 9 am kickoff was viewed favorably by Fox. No more are planned for this year, but we can expect more 9 am games next year.

Michael Mulvihill is FOX Sports EVP / Head of Strategy.

[twitter]https://twitter.com/mulvihill79/status/1325515934128242688[/twitter]

I dropped by the 9 am USC-ASU game last Saturday. One of the commentators suggested that it would be good for the Pac-12 to get more appreciation in the rest of the country, by being on TV when most of the country is watching. In context, re was referring to rankings, playoffs, and Voldemort (oops ... that flashy trophy awarded to the best player at the end of the regular season).

Cute logic, but nah...

There is an opportunity cost in play here.    There are a number of conferences that Fox can use to fill the Noon (Eastern) time slot.   Some of those conferences could get close to the USC-ASU ratings level and would not need to feature 2 different top 10 TV markets.

There are no other programs that will allow their players to start a game in the 11PM (Eastern) time slot, and therefore using precious potential 11PM (Eastern) content at Noon (Eastern) is not the optimal allocation.

It was a fun experiment because there are no fans in the stands this year, but we won't see it again at least not for conference games.   In early September when all 12 teams host non-conference games we might see Colorado or Utah get a 10AM (local time) game on the Pac-12 Network if their opponent is an FCS team.