While ESPN’s last college basketball innovation wasn’t received so well, it seems they’re still willing to try different things, and the latest one would appear to have more potential for success. From an ESPN PR e-mail, here’s what they’re doing for Thursday night’s Illinois-Indiana game:
The Thursday showcase game between No. 20 Indiana and Illinois (ESPN, 9 p.m.) will be called by Rece Davis and provide a “Backseat Coaches” perspective from analysts and former coaches Dan Dakich and Seth Greenberg.
Davis will be in the typical mid-court announcing position with Dakich seated next to the Illini’ bench and Greenberg positioned next to the Hoosiers’ bench. In addition to calling the game, Dakich and Greenberg will provide insight to what the coaches of their respective teams are thinking and how they might strategize if they were leading those teams. They will be coaching along – offering their own opinions as to what a coach could do in the game, as well as helping viewers understand why the actual coaches may be making the decisions they are.
This sounds a lot like the “Inside The Glass” or “1 up, 1 down” technique NBC, TSN, Sportsnet and others have often used for hockey, keeping the play-by-play man up high but moving the analyst (or in NBC’s case, the second analyst/sideline reporter) to the bench. That technique’s drawn a lot of praise on hockey broadcasts, as it allows the analyst to both get a sense of the conversations going on between coaches and players and also lets them see what the coaches and players are seeing. Doing it in basketball’s an interesting new wrinkle, though, as covering both benches with former coaches who will focus specifically on what the coaches are doing or could do. We’ll see how this plays out on Thursday night’s broadcast, but it would seem to have solid potential. If it succeeds the way the hockey idea has, this may become a frequently-used part of college basketball broadcasts.
