The Ohio Valley Conference announced that an agreement with ESPN was reached to extend the conference’s coverage through the 2030-31 academic season, according to OVC sports.  

The key piece of this deal is the pure volume of coverage that will be available to fans. At least 725 OVC sporting events will be broadcast on ESPN by a new service called ESPN Select. ESPN Select launched on Aug. 21. The ESPN Select Plan costs $11.99 per month. It also includes most sports games that are not broadcast on national television. In other words, this is a slight rebrand of the ESPN+ service, which improves the availability of college athletic events. 

For national television broadcasts, some OVC men’s and women’s basketball games will air on three primary channels: ESPN, ESPN2 and ESPNU. To access this plan, ESPN offers the ESPN Unlimited Plan, which includes ESPN+ sports games and ESPN cable channels. This service costs $29.99 per month. 

For fans who watch a wide range of college sports, the ESPN Unlimited Plan is a no-brainer. However, for primarily USI fans, the ESPN Select Plan is more economically feasible than the latter, as USI has no primetime games scheduled this year (unless either of the basketball teams makes the OVC Tournament Championship game or makes either of the national Division I tournaments).

For USI, this deal presents an opportunity for national exposure to the athletics program and illustrates a demand for sporting events. 

All information courtesy of OVC sports and ESPN.