Review of the 2024 CFB TV Early Season Selections

If you happened to miss any of the early season and special date start time & TV releases, feel free to head to my schedules site to look over how everything shook out.

* Over the course of the season, I'll be curious to see if ESPN's noon Eastern telecast window becomes less of a SEC window and more of a Big 12 or ACC window.  Many of the conference's members don't like the early start times and the SEC Network has went to moving back the start times of their early & mid afternoon windows to accommodate the schools' preferences.

* I guess I shouldn't be surprised that the SEC has six games hosted at their schools' stadiums in the first nine ABC slots.  Over the course of the weeks 1-3, the conference will feature in every game on ABC with the six games under their control, three neutral site games and as the road team vs. a Big 12 opponent.

How often the ACC and Big 12 appear in primetime on ABC over the course of the season will be of interest.  The conference will have three games in primetime on ABC on Saturdays in September alone (the Duke's Mayo Classic appears to count for the ACC if it counts for anyone at all).  

How often will the SEC be the default option at 7:30pm when they already have the 3:30pm window?  I'm going to put the over/under number of 7.5 games on ABC at 7:30pm over the course of 14 weeks, and that might still be too low, even with games like Oklahoma vs. Texas & Georgia vs. Florida remaining as afternoon games as they have been for years.  A new conference for the former, and a new broadcast network for the latter, didn't change those two games.

* Another "loser" with the SEC moving to ABC, for Black Friday at least, is the American.  It was known that the SEC would contribute a Black Friday game as they had in prior years with CBS.  The addition of a 2nd game was a bit of a surprise. The American, who has had a game on Black Friday on ABC since 2013 with the exception of the 2020 season, will be shut out of an ABC slot though they'll have a noon ET game on ESPN.

* I don't think it was a great surprise to see the FOX Friday night football schedule be void of big name schools like Ohio State, Penn State and Michigan.  West coast additions to both the Big 12 and Big Ten will feature in seven of the ten games (excluding Black Friday) and will host four of the the ten games, where they wouldn't otherwise be able to host a Big Noon game on FOX, so this is a way to get them some exposure with far less competition.

FOX skipped November 2nd, which would feature World Series Game 6 if needed.  If it isn't needed, I could see FOX simulcasting the San Diego State at Boise State game from FS1.

* From the announced windows that I've seen from CBS, and been provided regarding NBC's Big Ten windows and FOX's overall schedule, I'm not certain that we'll see as many late night broadcast network windows for the Big Ten as we've hoped / expected.  FOX may have moved a few of those over to Friday nights instead.  FS1 and BTN may be the place for Big Ten After Dark (Big 12 After Dark too along with ESPN).

* Regarding the previous item regarding late evening Big Ten games, I've had a few folks draw the conclusion that the Army - ND game at Yankee Stadium having a start time of 7pm is so that NBC can take on the USC at UCLA game after that.  What NBC has communicated to affiliates doesn't include a late evening telecast window on any week, and I can see NBC starting their Big Ten afternoon window a little bit earlier to provide some space before the Notre Dame game.

As for late evening NBC produced games, Peacock will have at least one, Boise State at Oregon, and could have others.  More should be know about the expected dates and times of the Peacock games as they populate inside of the app.

* ESPN preselected two Big 12 games into October and November: Cincinnati at Colorado on 10/26 and BYU at Arizona State on 11/23.  I can't tell if they did that because they're going to have limited linear TV space those two weeks for the Big 12, if they were the top choice (I'm assuming not), or if they were preselected as a potential late evening or mid-morning game. 

With other conference, if the game doesn't stick out as having significance, it tended to mean that it was in the middle of the selection process, like pre-selecting the 3rd or 4th pick of the week.  Both games are specially designated for each host school (Colorado: Family Weekend, ASU: Homecoming & Junior Sun Devil Club).  Maybe they'll end up being earlier in the day, whether its on ABC or ESPN.

* The NFL Network sublicense of Group of Five games from ESPN appears to be off the screen, at least through Week 3.  Not sure if that's due to NFLN's budget cuts or ESPN preferring to keep the content around.

* The four Mountain West controlled games on CBS matches their high mark from 2022, and with FOX carrying a game on Black Friday, the 2024 season will have the most Mountain West regular season games shown on an over-the-air TV network.

* ESPNU will carry a pair of Missouri Valley Football Conference this year, and I'm pretty sure these will be the first ESPN linear TV games for the conference since 2008.