MM 8.19: Big Ten announces seven-year media rights deal worth over $7 billion

This is the Maryland Minute, a short story followed by a roundup of Terps-related news.

The Big Ten Conference officially announced its new, record-breaking media rights deal Thursday. The deal, worth over $7 billion and spanning seven years, will distribute Big Ten games between FOX — which operates Big Ten Network and FOX Sports One — CBS, NBC and NBC’s Peacock streaming service.

The agreement also includes provisions for potential conference expansion, which has been frequently rumored following the announcement that USC and UCLA will join the Big Ten in 2024. The amount each school receives will gradually increase in the latter portion of the deal.

“The new rights agreements are an incredible achievement for our entire conference and a true testament of what can be accomplished with teamwork,” Big Ten Commissioner Kevin Warren said in a release. “I am incredibly grateful for collaborative efforts and hard work of our conference staff… and our partners at CBS, NBC and FOX Sports for solidifying unprecedented Big Ten access across transformative media companies for our fans to tune-in and follow the Big Ten content they love.”

Big Ten football will be in primetime all day, every Saturday, featured on FOX’s Big Noon Kickoff, CBS’ signature 3:30 p.m. game that formerly belonged to the SEC and a nighttime slot on NBC. The conference will also have the opportunity to broadcast late-night games from the West Coast with the impending additions of USC and UCLA. The networks will rotate the conference championship game, with CBS owning the rights in 2024 and 2028, NBC in 2026 and FOX in 2023, 2025, 2027 and 2029.

CBS will continue to show the semifinals and finals of the Big Ten Men’s Basketball Tournament and will show the women’s championship game for the first time as well.

Peacock, NBC’s popular streaming platform, will have exclusive rights to some Big Ten football and basketball games. Eight regular-season football games will appear on Peacock in addition to as many as 47 regular-season men’s basketball games and 30 regular-season women’s basketball games.

Notably, no Big Ten games in any sport will be shown on the ESPN family of networks after a 40-year partnership between the two entities.

Big Ten Network and FS1 will continue to show games from a variety of sports.

In other news

Terps women’s soccer kicked off the season against Temple, drawing with the Owls, 1-1.

Maryland football had three players named to the 2022 Polynesian College Football Player of the Year Award Watch List: defensive linemen Ami Finau and Mosiah Nasili-Kite and quarterback Taulia Tagovailoa.

Maryland freshman linebacker Jaishawn Barham was named to 247Sports’ Preseason True Freshman All-American Team.

Four former Terps are competing in the WNBA playoffs.

Maryland men’s soccer released its TV schedule for the 2022 season.

Terps wide receiver Dontay Demus Jr. threw down a dunk on the basketball court, showing that he is fully healed from the knee injury he suffered last season.

The demolition of Maryland’s Field Hockey & Lacrosse Complex ahead of its upcoming facelift is complete.