[DC 86]

It is important to recognize that "biggest brand" is heavily influenced by what ESPN covers and how it covers it. ESPN could probably make Stanford, Notre Dame, or just about anybody else that is halfway credible the "biggest brand" if they wanted to do so.

But why should they, as opposed to just jumping on board what is already the biggest brand? Ironically, if ESPN decided to make Stanford their marquee brand and most heavily promoted women's basketball program that would actually demonstrate favoritism, since we haven't achieved the on-court success that UConn has. UConn has objectively has won the most championships, played in the most final fours, had the most elite players, and subjectively they are led by a head coach who's outspoken and quotable. If there was no ESPN UConn would still be the most recognizable program and Geno would still be by far the best known and most loved/hated coach in the game. It seems rational that ESPN would focus on UConn as their flagship program. To build up a different program as the primary focus of coverage would be irrational, and evidence of favoritism.

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question: is there similar favoritism across sports? the patriots have been dominant over the last 15 years (and, like uconn, not in the last 2-3 years).  do the patriots get double the press of other teams? do the announcers strongly favor the patriots when they play?  when the duke men play basketball, do the announcers favor duke? does duke get an excess of their grads on the olympic team? does duke get double the press of other highly ranked teams?

Answer: yes. The women's basketball universe if far shallower than the NFL or men's basketball universe so it may not be "double" but of course marquee programs get much more coverage than others, that's inarguable. Count how many Patriots game are assigned to CBS's #1 team (Nantz/Romo). More to the point count how often the Cowboys have been in the NBC Sunday prime time game despite not being an elite team for decades.

Duke (men) has been far less dominant than UConn (women) yet they get an enormous amount of coverage; the most in the sport. Some googling along the lines of "Dick Vitale Duke homer" and "Jay Bilas Duke biased" will reveal the public perception on this subject.

I don't have access to network-level data, but just for fun I googled "Duke Basketball" (which last won the title in 2015) and "Villanova Basketball" (champions in 2016 and 2018). Duke: 83 million hits, Villanova: 13 million hits. This is an imperfect proxy, but surely correlates to national media coverage to a large degree.

[DC 86]

It is important to recognize that "biggest brand" is heavily influenced by what ESPN covers and how it covers it. ESPN could probably make Stanford, Notre Dame, or just about anybody else that is halfway credible the "biggest brand" if they wanted to do so.

But why should they, as opposed to just jumping on board what is already the biggest brand? Ironically, if ESPN decided to make Stanford their marquee brand and most heavily promoted women's basketball program that would actually demonstrate favoritism, since we haven't achieved the on-court success that UConn has. UConn has objectively has won the most championships, played in the most final fours, had the most elite players, and subjectively they are led by a head coach who's outspoken and quotable. If there was no ESPN UConn would still be the most recognizable program and Geno would still be by far the best known and most loved/hated coach in the game. It seems rational that ESPN would focus on UConn as their flagship program. To build up a different program as the primary focus of coverage would be irrational, and evidence of favoritism.

---

question: is there similar favoritism across sports? the patriots have been dominant over the last 15 years (and, like uconn, not in the last 2-3 years).  do the patriots get double the press of other teams? do the announcers strongly favor the patriots when they play?  when the duke men play basketball, do the announcers favor duke? does duke get an excess of their grads on the olympic team? does duke get double the press of other highly ranked teams?

Answer: yes. The women's basketball universe if far shallower than the NFL or men's basketball universe so it may not be "double" but of course marquee programs get much more coverage than others, that's inarguable. Count how many Patriots game are assigned to CBS's #1 team (Nantz/Romo). More to the point count how often the Cowboys have been in the NBC Sunday prime time game despite not being an elite team for decades.

Duke (men) has been far less dominant than UConn (women) yet they get an enormous amount of coverage; the most in the sport. Some googling along the lines of "Dick Vitale Duke homer" and "Jay Bilas Duke biased" will reveal the public perception on this subject.

I don't have access to network-level data, but just for fun I googled "Duke Basketball" (which last won the title in 2015) and "Villanova Basketball" (champions in 2016 and 2018). Duke: 83 million hits, Villanova: 13 million hits. This is an imperfect proxy, but surely correlates to national media coverage to a large degree.