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56-666: In 2008, the undefeated Bulldogs won the NCAA Division II National Football Championship —the first Division II championship in any sport at the school. On December 18, 2010, the Bulldogs won their second Division II national title in football. On April 9, 2011, the Bulldogs men's ice hockey program won its first NCAA Division I national championship, beating Michigan 3–2 in overtime. The Bulldog women's ice hockey program has won five NCAA Division I national titles. The UMD Bulldogs compete in

112-694: A 4:3 full-screen to a letterboxed format (via the application of the AFD #10 display flag), which occurred on June 1 of that year. WatchESPN was a website for desktop computers , as well as an application for smartphones and tablet computers that allowed subscribers of participating pay-TV providers to watch live streams of programming from ESPN and its sister networks (except for ESPN Classic), including most sporting events, on computers, mobile devices, Apple TV , Roku and Xbox Live via their TV Everywhere login provided by their cable provider. The service originally launched on October 25, 2010, as ESPN Networks,

168-832: A college rugby team since 1975. UMD plays in USA Rugby's Division II, and in 2013 reached the DII national playoffs. UM Duluth rugby offers limited scholarships to select players. UMD graduate Graham Harriman has played for the United States national rugby team . UMD has produced an Alpine Ski team since the 1960s. UMD Alpine Ski teams (both men and women's) compete together in the U.S. Collegiate Ski and Snowboard Association ( USCSA ). The USCSA comprises over 170 Colleges and Universities competing in Alpine, Snowboard, Free-style & Cross-Country Skiing (Nordic). UMD Alpine has qualified

224-553: A 24-hour sports channel in January 2004. ESPNU is a subscription television network that launched on March 4, 2005, that focuses on college athletics including basketball, football, baseball , college swimming, and ice hockey . SEC Network is a subscription television network that launched on August 14, 2014, focusing on the coverage of sporting events sanctioned by the Southeastern Conference . Created as

280-923: A joint venture of network operator ESPN Inc. and the ACC. ESPN+ is an American over-the-top subscription video streaming service available in the United States, owned by the ESPN division of the Walt Disney Company, in partnership with ESPN Inc. ESPN launched its high definition simulcast feed, originally branded as ESPNHD , on March 30, 2003, with an Opening Day broadcast of the Texas Rangers and Anaheim Angels . All studio shows based in Bristol and at L. A. Live, along with most live event telecasts on ESPN, are broadcast in high definition. ESPN

336-408: A joint venture with Fox Sports and TNT Sports to offer Venu Sports , including the three organizations' main linear sports channels and associated media rights, beginning in fall 2024. Additionally, the company plans to launch a "flagship" standalone streaming offering, including the ESPN and ESPN2 linear channels, in late summer or fall 2025. Alongside its live sports broadcasts, ESPN also airs

392-602: A large number of NCAA football games, creating an opportunity for fans to be able to view multiple games each weekend (instead of just one), the same deal that the NCAA had previously negotiated with TBS. ESPN's breakthrough moment occurred in 1987 when it secured a contract with the NFL to broadcast eight games during that year's regular season – all of which aired on Sunday nights, marking the first broadcasts of Sunday NFL primetime games. ESPN's Sunday Night Football games would become

448-550: A lead-in to the primetime game and adding the MLB Network -produced Intentional Talk to ESPN2 's daily lineup. On April 12, 2018, ESPN began a supplemental over-the-top streaming service known as ESPN+ . After having last carried national-televised NHL games in 2004, ESPN and ABC agreed in March 2021 on a seven-year contract to televise games, with some airing on ESPN+ and Hulu . The contract also awarded four of

504-478: A limited array of events not broadcast on ESPN (most notably, the NBA Finals ). ESPN2 was launched on October 1, 1993. It carried a broad mix of event coverage from conventional sports—including auto racing , college basketball and NHL hockey—to extreme sports —such as BMX , skateboarding and motocross . The " ESPN BottomLine ", a ticker displaying sports news and scores during all programming that

560-506: A national sports talk radio network providing analysis and commentary programs (including shows such as Mike and Mike in the Morning and The Herd ) as well as audio play-by-play of sporting events (including some simulcast with the ESPN television channel). On October 10, 1993, ESPN2 – a secondary channel that originally was programmed with a separate lineup of niche sports popular with males 18–49 years old (with snowboarding and

616-493: A new betting-themed daily program, Daily Wager , hosted by the network's gambling analyst Doug Kezirian. The program was ESPN's first regularly scheduled program solely dedicated to gaming-related content. On May 14, 2019, ESPN announced a deal with casino operator Caesars Entertainment to establish an ESPN-branded studio at The LINQ Hotel & Casino in Las Vegas to produce betting-themed content. In order to help offset

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672-548: A period during the 1980s, the network had boxing tournaments, crowning champions in different boxing weight divisions as "ESPN champions". The next major stepping stone for ESPN came throughout a couple of months in 1984. During this period, the American Broadcasting Company (ABC) purchased 100% of ESPN from the Rasmussens and Getty Oil. Under Getty ownership, the channel was unable to compete for

728-442: A phone feature, then after its termination into a Verizon Wireless paid service. Technologies developed for it have since been transferred to the network's successful mobile strategy in the smartphone era. ESPN Classic was a subscription television network that launched in 1995 as Classic Sports Network, founded by Brian Bedol and Steve Greenberg. ESPN Inc. purchased Classic Sports Network in 1997 for $ 175 million, rebranding

784-538: A result of a 20-year broadcast partnership between the two entities, the network is a joint venture between the conference and ESPN Inc., which operates the network. Launching on August 22, 2019, the ACC Network is a subscription television network that focuses on the sporting events of the Atlantic Coast Conference as part of a current agreement extending to the 2036–37 academic term as

840-539: A streaming service that provided a live stream of ESPN exclusive to Time Warner Cable subscribers. ESPN3 , an online streaming service providing live streams and replays of global sports events that launched in 2005 as a separate website, was incorporated into the WatchESPN platform on August 31, 2011. Likewise, ESPN+ was launched in April 2018 as an add-on subscription for $ 4.99 per month. On June 1, 2019, WatchESPN

896-603: A team to the USCSA National Championships every year since 2004 (Men's, women's or both). UMD Alpine is one of 2 colleges in its division to hold that distinction out of 20 colleges. UMD, at one time, also sponsored a number of other successful varsity programs such as men's tennis, men's golf , women's golf, wrestling , men's and women's swimming and diving , and men's and women's cross-country skiing . NCAA Division II National Football Championship The NCAA Division II football championship

952-421: A variety of sports highlight, talk, and documentary-styled shows. These include: Many of ESPN's documentary programs (such as 30 for 30 and Nine for IX ) are produced by ESPN Films , a film division created in March 2008 as a restructuring of ESPN Original Entertainment, a programming division that was originally formed in 2001. 30 for 30 started airing in 2009 and continues airing to this day. Each episode

1008-728: Is a minority owner of The Sports Network (TSN) and the French-language Réseau des sports (RDS). ESPN also has a minority stake in J Sports in Japan. ESPN moved into the sports betting scene in November 2023 with plans to launch their sportsbook app "ESPN Bet" on November 14. In a partnership with Penn Entertainment, ESPN Bet began in 17 states. Once live, ESPN featured betting odds from their own sportsbook on their content. ESPN has been criticized for focusing too much on men's college and professional sports (particularly

1064-752: Is an American college football tournament played annually to determine a champion at the NCAA Division II level. It was first held in 1973, as a single-elimination playoff with eight teams. The tournament field has subsequently been expanded three times: to 16 teams in 1988, 24 teams in 2004, and 28 teams in 2016. The national championship game has been held in eight different cities. Former sites include Sacramento, California (1973–1975); Wichita Falls, Texas (1976–1977); Longview, Texas (1978); Albuquerque, New Mexico (1979–1980); McAllen, Texas (1981–1985); Florence, Alabama (1986–2013); and Kansas City, Kansas (2014–2017). From 1973 through 1985 (with

1120-575: Is now used by all of ESPN's networks, originated on ESPN2 in 1995. In the late 1990s, ESPN2 was gradually reformatted to serve as a secondary outlet for ESPN's mainstream sports programming. ESPNews is a subscription television network that was launched on November 1, 1996, originally focusing solely on sports news, highlights, and press conferences . Since August 2010, the network has gradually incorporated encores of ESPN's various sports debate and entertainment shows and video simulcasts of ESPN Radio shows, in addition to sports news programming. Since

1176-645: Is one of the few television networks with an all-digital infrastructure. Archived non-HD programming is presented in 4:3 standard definition with stylized pillarboxing . Pardon the Interruption and Around the Horn began airing in HD on September 27, 2010, with the relocation of the production of both shows into the facility housing the Washington, D.C. , bureau for ABC News . ESPN broadcasts HD programming in

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1232-657: Is through the eyes of a well known filmmaker and has featured some of the biggest directors in Hollywood. The 30 for 30 film O.J.: Made in America won the Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature in 2017 , the first such Oscar for ESPN. Ultimate Fighting Championship signed a five-year contract with ESPN starting 2019 on ESPN and ESPN+ which estimate every quarter 2 event on UFC on ESPN and 6 events on UFC Fight Night on ESPN+. In March 2019, ESPN announced

1288-422: The 720p resolution format, because ABC executives proposed a progressive scan signal that resolves fluid and high-speed motion in sports better, particularly during slow-motion replays. The network's Digital Center itself natively holds 2160p UHD/4K operations and equipment. In 2011, ESPNHD began to downplay its distinct promotional logo in preparation for the conversion of its standard definition feed from

1344-613: The American Athletic Conference , Big 12 Conference , Mid-American Conference , Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference , Sun Belt Conference and the Western Athletic Conference . ESPN distributes various content on Snapchat Discover, including a Snapchat-only version of SportsCenter . ESPN MVP (initially known as Mobile ESPN) was a 2005 attempt at operating a mobile virtual network operator with exclusive mobile content, first as

1400-568: The Associated Press (AP) and United Press International (UPI) during, and at the end of, each regular season. The AP polled a panel of writers, while UPI polled a panel of coaches. When UPI began its poll in 1958, it explained that the poll would cover college football programs not considered "major" by the Football Writers Association of America (FWAA), with the small schools (then numbering 519) belonging to

1456-455: The NFL Draft , bringing it also to a mass audience and over time creating a television "event". That same month the network began broadcasting Top Rank Boxing on ESPN , marking the beginning of its involvement with televised professional boxing . The show lasted 16 years, and ESPN has since shown boxing live intermittently with other shows including ESPN Friday Night Fights and others. For

1512-791: The Texas Longhorns varsity sports teams of the University of Texas at Austin . It features events from the 20 sports sanctioned by the Texas athletic department, along with original programming (including historical, academic and cultural content). It was discontinued on June 30, 2024, a day before the Longhorns' move to the Southeastern Conference . ESPN owns and operates regional channels in Brazil, Caribbean , Latin America , Netherlands, Oceania and Sub-Saharan Africa . In Canada, ESPN

1568-560: The World Series of Poker as its headliners) as well as serving as an overflow channel for ESPN – launched on cable systems reaching to 10 million subscribers. It became the fastest-growing cable channel in the U.S. during the 1990s, eventually expanding its national reach to 75 million subscribers. Ownership of ABC, and thus control of ESPN, was acquired by Capital Cities Communications in 1985. ESPN's parent company renamed themselves as Capital Cities/ABC Inc. Capital Cities/ABC Inc.

1624-403: The "exclusive beer advertised on the network". ESPN launched on September 7, 1979, beginning with the first telecast of what would become the channel's flagship program, SportsCenter . Taped in front of a small live audience inside the Bristol studios, it was broadcast to 1.4 million cable subscribers throughout the United States. ESPN's next big step forward came when the channel acquired

1680-567: The 16 following sports: The Minnesota Duluth Bulldogs men's hockey program plays at the NCAA Division I level as a member of the National Collegiate Hockey Conference . The Bulldogs play off campus in downtown Duluth, Minnesota at the new AMSOIL Arena . The team has been successful with numerous Frozen Four appearances, including a 4-overtime loss to Bowling Green in the 1984 Championship game –

1736-625: The 2013 cancellation of Highlight Express , programming consists mainly of rebroadcasts of SportsCenter . ESPNews also serves as an overflow feed due to programming conflicts caused by sporting events on the other ESPN networks. ESPN Deportes ( Spanish pronunciation: [i.es.piˈen deˈpoɾtes] , "ESPN Sports") is a subscription television network that was originally launched in July 2001 to provide Spanish simulcasts of certain Major League Baseball telecasts from ESPN. It became

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1792-731: The AP and UPI polls were completed, therefore these games did not factor in selecting a national champion for the College Division . The bowl games were: Winners of regional bowls From 1973 to 1977, some of the tournament games were also known by bowl names; ESPN ESPN (an abbreviation of its original name, the Entertainment and Sports Programming Network ) is an American international basic cable sports channel owned by The Walt Disney Company (80% and operational control) and Hearst Communications (20%) through

1848-854: The NBA and NFL), and very little on women's sports or extreme sports. Baseball , ice hockey , and soccer fans have also criticized ESPN for not giving their respective sports more coverage. Other criticism has focused on ethnicity in ESPN's varying mediated forms, as well as carriage fees and issues regarding the exportation of ESPN content. Some critics argue that ESPN's success is their ability to provide other enterprise and investigative sports news while competing with other hard sports-news-producing outlets such as Yahoo! Sports and Fox Sports . Some scholars have challenged ESPN's journalistic integrity, calling for an expanded standard of professionalism to prevent biased coverage and conflicts of interest. On October 8, 2019, Deadspin reported that an internal memo

1904-613: The NCAA Committee on Infractions. Most of the participants in early national championship games have moved into Division I , the main catalyst for their moves being the creation of Division I-AA, now the Division I Football Championship Subdivision (FCS), in 1978 . The following Division II title game participants later moved to Division I: From 1964 to 1972, four regional bowl games were played in order to provide postseason action, however these games took place after

1960-549: The NCAA, the NAIA , both, or neither. The AP began its poll in 1960. Since 1973, a post-season tournament has been held to determine the Division II Champion. The current format, in use since 2016, features 28 teams. They are organized into 4 super-regions of 7 teams each, with the top-seeded team in each super-region getting a bye during the first round. Prior to the championship game, all contests are hosted by

2016-607: The Whalers), first rented office space in Plainville, Connecticut . However, the plan to base ESPN there was put on hold because of a local ordinance prohibiting buildings from bearing rooftop satellite dishes . Available land to build their own facility on was quickly found in Bristol, Connecticut (where the channel remains headquartered to this day), with funding to buy the property provided by Getty Oil , which purchased 85% of

2072-654: The backing of ABC, ESPN's ability to compete for major sports contracts greatly increased, and gave it credibility within the sports broadcasting industry. Later that year, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in NCAA v. Board of Regents of the University of Oklahoma (1984) that the NCAA could no longer monopolize the rights to negotiate the contracts for college football games, allowing each school to negotiate broadcast deals on their own. ESPN took full advantage and began to broadcast

2128-428: The channel as "ESPN Classic" in 1998. The channel broadcast notable archived sporting events (originally including events from earlier decades, but later focusing mainly on events from the 1990s and later), as well as sports documentaries and sports-themed movies. It was discontinued on December 31, 2021. The Longhorn Network was a subscription television network that launched on August 26, 2011, focusing on events from

2184-423: The company from Bill Rasmussen on February 22, 1979, in an attempt to diversify the company's holdings. This helped the credibility of the fledgling company; however, there were still many doubters about the viability of their sports channel concept. Another event that helped build ESPN's credibility was securing an advertising agreement with Anheuser-Busch in the spring of 1979; the company invested $ 1 million to be

2240-463: The end of each regular season by two major wire services , the Associated Press (AP) and United Press International (UPI). In some years, the two polls named different number one teams. From 1964 to 1972, postseason bowl games crowned four regional champions. NCAA Division II bowl games still exist, but only as postseason contests for teams not qualifying for the championship playoffs. Polls to rank "small college" football teams were conducted by

2296-617: The exception of 1978) the championship game carried a bowl designation (see NCAA Division II bowl games ). Since 2018, the championship game has been played at the McKinney ISD Stadium and Community Event Center in McKinney, Texas . Since 1994, the games have been broadcast on ESPN . Prior to 1973, for what was then called the NCAA College Division , national champions were selected by polls conducted at

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2352-1033: The higher-seeded team. the semi-final games are held at the home stadiums of the two highest-seeded remaining teams. Since 2018, the championship game has been played at the McKinney Independent School District Stadium , a 12,000 seat facility that opened in August 2018. Programs that no longer compete in Division II are indicated in italics . Of the programs that no longer compete in D-II, Akron , Central Michigan , Jacksonville State , Louisiana Tech , Texas State , Troy and Western Kentucky currently compete in Division I FBS. All others compete in Division I FCS. † Mississippi College's 1989 tournament participation, along with its championship, were vacated by

2408-437: The highest-rated NFL telecasts for the next 17 years (before losing the rights to NBC in 2006). The channel's decision to broadcast NFL games on Sunday evenings resulted in a decline in viewership for the daytime games shown on the major broadcast networks, marking the first time that ESPN had been a legitimate competitor to NBC and CBS, which had long dominated the sports television market. In 1992, ESPN launched ESPN Radio ,

2464-553: The impact of COVID-19 on its business, Walt Disney CEO Bob Chapek indicated during a 4th quarter fiscal year 2021 earnings conference that the company would increase its presence in online sports betting, including in partnership with third parties. In 2023, The Pat McAfee Show moved to ESPN as part of a five-year $ 85 million deal. The show replaced the Noon ET airing of SportsCenter and This Just In with Max Kellerman . Since September 2006, ESPN has been integrated with

2520-488: The joint venture ESPN Inc. The company was founded in 1979 by Bill Rasmussen , Scott Rasmussen and Ed Eagan. ESPN broadcasts primarily from studio facilities located in Bristol, Connecticut . The network also operates offices and auxiliary studios in Miami , Orlando , New York City , Las Vegas , Seattle , Charlotte , Washington, D.C. , and Los Angeles . James Pitaro has been chairman since March 5, 2018, following

2576-688: The longest championship game in the NCAA tournament's history, and three championships in 2011, 2018, and 2019. The Minnesota–Duluth Bulldogs women's hockey team also plays at the NCAA Division I level as a member of the Western Collegiate Hockey Association . The women's program has been one of the top women's teams in the nation winning 5 NCAA DI ice hockey championships, including the 2010 championship. Minnesota–Duluth's softball team appeared in two Women's College World Series in 1970 and 1971. UMD has fielded

2632-560: The network's success, criticism of ESPN includes accusations of biased coverage, conflict of interest , and controversies with individual broadcasters and analysts. Bill Rasmussen came up with the concept of ESPN in May 1978, after he was fired from his job with the World Hockey Association 's New England Whalers . Rasmussen and his ESPN co-founder Ed Eagan, joined by Rasmussen's son Scott (who had also been let go by

2688-672: The resignation of John Skipper on December 18, 2017. As of December 2023 , ESPN is available to approximately 70 million pay television households in the United States—down from its 2011 peak of 100 million households. It operates regional channels in Africa, Australia, Latin America, and the Netherlands. In Canada, it owns a 20% interest in The Sports Network (TSN) and its five sister networks. Despite

2744-506: The rights to broadcast coverage of the early rounds of the NCAA Division I men's basketball tournament . It first aired its games in March 1980, helping bring attention to what is today known as " March Madness ". The channel's tournament coverage also launched the broadcasting career of Dick Vitale , who at the time he joined ESPN had just been fired as head coach of the Detroit Pistons . In April of that year ESPN began televising

2800-438: The seven Stanley Cup Finals to both ESPN and ABC. All other nationally televised games would air on TBS and TNT under a separate deal the league struck with Turner Sports the following month. On August 8, 2023, ESPN and Penn Entertainment announced a deal to brand Penn's sportsbooks with ESPN branding. Penn's existing Barstool Sportsbook would be rebranded as ESPN Bet in fall 2023. On February 6, 2024, ESPN announced

2856-402: The sports division of sister broadcast network ABC , with sports events televised on that network airing under the banner ESPN on ABC ; much of ABC's sports coverage since the rebranding has become increasingly limited to secondary coverage of sporting events whose broadcast rights are held by ESPN (such as NBA games, NHL games, and the X Games and its related qualifying events) as well as

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2912-427: The sports network had been terminated, among them athletes-turned-analysts Trent Dilfer and Danny Kanell , and noted journalists like NFL beat reporter Ed Werder and Major League Baseball expert Jayson Stark . Further cost-cutting measures taken included moving the studio operations of ESPNU to Bristol from Charlotte, North Carolina , reducing its longtime MLB studio show Baseball Tonight to Sundays as

2968-535: The television rights to major sports events contracts as its majority corporate parent would not provide the funding, leading ESPN to lose out for broadcast deals with the National Hockey League (to USA Network ) and NCAA Division I college football (to TBS ). For years, the NFL , NBA , and Major League Baseball refused to consider cable as a means of broadcasting some of their games. However, with

3024-438: Was discontinued with the service's full merger into the ESPN app. ESPN Regional Television (formerly branded as ESPN Plus) is the network's syndication arm, which produces collegiate sporting events for free-to-air television stations throughout the United States (primarily those affiliated with networks such as The CW and MyNetworkTV or independent stations ). ESPN Plus syndicates college football and basketball games from

3080-515: Was sent to ESPN employees instructing them to avoid any political discussions regarding the People's Republic of China and Hong Kong in the aftermath of a tweet by Houston Rockets general manager Daryl Morey . ESPN has won 232 Sports Emmy Awards in 35 years of eligibility. In 2024, ESPN apologized for submitting fake names for Sports Emmy award consideration over many years, and returned 37 trophies that had been awarded to ineligible recipients to

3136-463: Was then acquired by The Walt Disney Company in 1996 and was re-branded as Walt Disney Television . Challenges began to appear in the 2000s. ESPN began to shed viewers, more than 10 million over a period of several years in the 2010s even while paying large sums of money for the broadcast rights to properties like the NFL, NBA and College Football Playoff . On April 26, 2017, approximately 100 ESPN employees were notified that their positions with

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