Initial Pac-12 TV Schedule Announced, Half Of Oregon St.'s Games Have A Start Time

The initial tv selections for Pac-12 games, including all of the games in the first 3 weeks that the conference controls, and the other games that have initially been picked up by any of the conference's partner carriers ESPN and FOX. were announced today, and Oregon St. now knows the start time and carriage for half of their games.

The season opener against Eastern Washington on Aug. 31 will be at 3 PM, with coverage by the Pac-12 Network nationally.

The second game, against Hawaii on Sept. 7, will be an early evening affair, starting at 5 PM. It will be a split broadcast on the Pac-12 channel, with Colorado's game against Central Arkansas in the same time slot. Expect Oregon St.'s game to be carried everywhere except the Mountain channel/area.

The Beavers' first road game, at Utah on Sept. 14, will be a night game, with kickoff at 8 PM MDT (7 PM PDT) in Salt Lake City. Fox Sports 1 will carry the game.

For those unfamiliar with what "Fox Sports 1" is, since it isn't yet, it will be Fox Sports new competition for ESPN. It will be a rebranding of what is currently the SPEED Channel, which currently covers exclusively motor sports and related subject matter.

In August, Fox will shift to an all sports format, still including some auto racing, but also college football, as well as all their other sports properties, and studio programming, designed to compete directly with ESPN's primary channel.

We already knew Oregon St.'s second road game, Sept. 21 at San Diego St., will be at 4:30 PM, and carried by CBS Sports Net, a part of the Mt. West Conference's programming package.

Two of the big games later in the season have already been selected for national coverage as well, and they are the games you would expect.

Oregon St.'s Friday night showdown with USC on Nov. 1 won't be really late, starting at 6 PM, and will be carried by ESPN2. (Expect gridlock approaching Reser to exist by mid-afternoon.)

Finally, the Civil War from Autzen Stadium on Friday Nov. 29 will also be carried by Fox 1, and will start at 4 PM. It concludes a "Northwest Doubleheader", as the Apple Cup, this year in newly renovated Husky Stadium, will go at 12:30 PM.

Other games will be selected 1 or 2 weeks before game day as the partners, ESPN and FOX make their selections based on whose' hot nationally and the rest of the college football schedule, and then the Pac-12 Network will piece together what's left.

It's a better schedule than last year, as far as having more of the most desirable late afternoon (somewhere between 3 and 4:30) starts than all of last year, but its still light on national exposure for a team that finished the 2012 season in the top 20, and is expected to debut as a top 25 team.

Andy_Wooldridge@yahoo.com