Bison hoops: TV progress is there, albeit slow, but a new BSA wouldn’t hurt, either

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NDSU will get a piece of the national stage Friday night when the Bison play at Akron on ESPN2 as part of the ESPN BracketBuster series. It’s the last year of the cross-country mid-major matchups, which is unfortunate since such TV appearances are generally rare for mid-majors.

The fact teams from the Summit, MAC or Horizon aren’t regular ESPN inhabitants is certainly not a surprise since TV is market driven. But I also like the BracketBuster in that it makes for a nice break from Duke, Michigan State or Indiana every weekend.

NDSU appears to be making some progress with basketball air time. The Bison will be on TV eight times in the regular season with some sort of Fox, Midco or ESPN combination. Oakland, which plays more major foes, will also be on eight times. South Dakota State has 10 TV games this season. On the other end, according to its website anyway, Western Illinois has no TV games other than its in-house Rocky Vision web stream.

Last year, the Bison had 10 games televised. In 2010-11. The prior year, there were only three and in 2009-10, there were six.

Akron plays in a 5,500-seat Rhodes Arena and is averaging 3,473 fans a game. Sounds pretty close to what NDSU presents in Fargo although Rhodes was built in the mid-1980s and has undergone a couple of renovations. This is beating a horse that has been dead for years, but until NDSU completes its renovation, it won’t be the cool mid-major TV atmosphere of other schools at its level.

Bison football had every game last fall on the tube, a result of a sold-out Fargodome and state-wide interest that makes for attractive ad sales. Basketball isn’t there yet, although a new arena will go a long way toward that. I’m of the belief the BSA as it is now is a detriment of over 1,000 fans on average per game. Nobody wants to sit on a hard, old bleachers anymore; it’s just not the generational thing to do. I’m also of the belief that NDSU needs to find its way on MidCo Sports Network even more. The network has shown the enthusiasm to be the regional TV sports source.

32 thoughts on “Bison hoops: TV progress is there, albeit slow, but a new BSA wouldn’t hurt, either”

  1. Be interesting to see what Akron’s arena looks like on TV. I’d prefer bleacher seating for the student section but, hey, as long as the seating wraps around the court, I won’t complain.

  2. I keep hearing there is a hope to have the funds soon so by April of so they can break ground on the renovation. I think it would be a pretty cool thing if they could announce the funds were in place and the renovation starting at the Summit League Tournament press conference. Gene can probably give Saul an extension at that time as well.

    If NDSU goes more to the Midco Sports Network, the MSN needs to find a way onto the Sports Package for DirecTV. The Bison game with SDSU was supposed to be on but DirecTV pulled it due to lack of bandwidth. MSN also needs to go HD. I can’t understand why there are some channels that are still not HD. KVLY also needs to figure out how to make the Bison football games HD next season. It would be nice if Go Bison All Access could start broadcasting in HD as well. ESPN3 does broadcast in HD for the most part. I would also like to see an app for TV’s and Blu-Ray players that can broadcast shows off the internet for Go Bison All Access.

  3. Jeff why have UND, SDSU and USD all signed contracts with MIdco and NDSU hasn’t? Didn’t Midco offer the Bison only those other three schools? Do you think that UND and SDSU having superior future indoor track facilities and indoorfootball practice facilities hurt Bison recruiting in both sports? What is the plan for an indoor football practice facilty? Is there one? One last thing do you think the Bison missed not going after Moorhead Spud senior Aaron Lien?

    • give it up bisonjeff, every single blog post you do this, we get it, you love those other teams. you and bison03 can go to those places and stay away, its sickening.

      the state of north dakota is holding back ndsu, plain and simple and its a crock of BS>

    • what in hell is wrong with our leaders in Fargo. It seems all they want to do is build sports arenas. It is usually the taxpayer who get stuck with the bill.

      • Except that the entire funding of the BSA renovation is private funds. But don’t let that get in the way of your argument.

    • Midco isn’t available in Fargo, the largest city in the state and the home, of the… BISON!! And for the other small markets its in, not everyone has Midco. They may have Dish, Directv, or CableOne. Prolly makes sense the the other schools. We generally have larger crowds and will go for something bigger. Besides we own our own rights and bug airtime and produce our own games

  4. I would like to see more basketball games on Midco. That said the football program has a better deal with NBC ND, the school’s games are available to everyone in the state with a TV, plus a number of people in outlying states.

    Midco games are just available on Midco, a network that most people in Fargo can’t even access.

  5. Midco has done a great job. Midco has offices in gfks,and is main cable network in ad for both schools. Midco is in west Fargo but not Fargo. Fargo has cableone. Cableone has had its share of customer shaftishfaction.

    • NDSU’s goal should be FSN, it should done by now, i have no idea what they are doing at NDSU marketing, but I would be camped out on FSN’s doorstep everyday pitching NDSU especially with gopher sports all heading to Big Ten Network.

    • Yes, FSN is driven by MSP market first and foremost. Reality is Bison athletics would take a backseat quite frankly to D2 and D3 sports in that market, especially metro area colleges like St. Thomas. Would be surprised to see a formal multi-game agreement with FSN come about.

      • Ndsu has as many alumni living in Minneapolis than any of those D3 schools and well known in Minneapolis metro. Thats why we have radio affiliates there. Besides they aired UND Hockey more than other Minnesota schools not named the Gophers . They also air a bunch of weird stuff nobody cares about. Dont buy it.

        • When have any UND games NOT involving MN been on FSN? (Excluding the Final Five) If you are talking about FCS (Fox College Sports) that’s an entirely different animal and NDSU could likely get on there if they (NDSU) made the right offer (free).

  7. The renovated BSA will be a boost for NDSU hoops but will we quickly outgrow it?

    Do the plans for the renovated BSA allow for any future expansion?

    • Not a chance they outgrow it, unless Bison basketball somehow grows into a product that can compete for an at-large bid to the NCAA tournament on a regular basis. That will probably never happen in the Summit League.

  8. Jeff : Your intuition tells you 1,000 people are not attending because B.S.A. is uncomfortable, how does this new replacement help ? The renderings show a “sunken” version of the same B.S.A. Fold out bench seats with that multi-sport look ; that went out favor 20 years ago. Look at Weber States bb facility and then I’ll support a new facility. The Wildcats bb facility was designed and built for one purpose with some real seats. ON BISON.

    • The new BSA will have a basketball arena that doesn’t have fold up seats. They started with them because of the track and field teams but they no longer need them since they have the track and field facility.

  9. I counted UND games and they have 10 on TV this year including all Conference games on Bigsky TV. Their Women’s program has 5-6 games on TV as well as Big Sky TV. Volleyball and Women’s Hockey also have 5-6 on TV as well. Their football and men’s hockey teams have all homes games on TV.

    How does Taylor not see that and think…..maybe I should try and get more sports than football and a few Men’s Basketball games on TV? They have 6 sports on TV regularly. Get with the times.

    • Big Sky is basically the same thing as Go Bison All Access is. It is a web based video and synched audio feed. All Bison home games and quite a few away games (at schools with websites managed by Neulion) are also available.

      Go Bison All Access is a good deal and when it is broadcast in HD and has apps for TV’s and Blu-Ray players it will make sure we get to watch the Bison when they are on.

    • The TL Stroh folks know their stuff and of course they’ve had enough time to master the plan. We live in an age where facility is everything, not sure how else to put it. My intuition is BSA costs 1,000 fans on most nights with this good men’s team, total guess. Who knows. I went to Fargo South and went into the school awhile back after the huge renovation. I didn’t even recognize it. I would bet same will hold true with BSA.

      • NDSU will also be in complete control of the arena which is an added benefit. This $32 or so million renovation gives NDSU alot of bang for the buck. It improves the weight room, administrative and coaches offices and provides 2 practice courts for the basketball teams.

  11. Fsn needs programming and fsn reaches all of dakotas and Minnesota obviously. NDSU has shown the twin cities area they have viewers. Heck. Football alone would be great for fsn, right now they show random college games. NDSU hoops with a new arena would help fsn see them as gonzaga as midwest

  12. I have DirecTV and live in Fargo, putting more games on MidCo would not be of any benefit to the home crowd of the Bison. There has to be a better way to get games on TV. UND is flat out lucky they got into a Conf. with an established network of showing teams, that is nothing that UND had to work for. You used to be able to scroll the channels and see the UND hockey games and that is also gone. Until I find out a way to DVR a broadcast purchased online, I don’t care to hear about that either. At this point, NDSU doing any business with MidCo would only benefit NDSU and the fan base not located in the home town of the Bison.

    • And now this guy says going on midco would only benefit NDSU fans not in Fargo. Isn’t that the point of being on tv? To reach out to fringe and regional fans that aren’t able to make it to Fargo to the games?

  13. That’s funny. A new arena, sorry, redesigned and remodeled arena, is now going to make the product more palatable for television? Is that how it works now?