On Tuesday, the Mountain West Conference announced various TV assignments for their 2020 schedule, which begins on October 24th.
This is the first year of the Mountain West’s new rights deals with CBS and Fox, and while the CBS Sports Network coverage for 21 games looks somewhat familiar, the 21 games on Fox’s networks will be sure to raise some eyebrows. That’s because of the presence of a network rarely uttered in live sports circles: FS2.
Here is the initial schedule for #MWFB on @FoxSports pic.twitter.com/vAzCUm4WqZ
— Mountain West (@MountainWest) October 13, 2020
One game (New Mexico-Colorado State on October 24th) will definitely air on FS2, while another nine will air either on FS1 or FS2. Ten more will definitely air on FS1 (with kickoff times yet to be announced outside of the first four matchups), and the MWC Championship Game will air either on Fox or FS1.
The aforementioned CBS Sports Network schedule is much more straightforward, with kickoff times and dates announced for all 21 games, which all air on CBS SN.
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Dates and kick times have been solidified for @CBSSportsNet #MWFB | #AtThePeak pic.twitter.com/7u3GEdr9ik
— Mountain West (@MountainWest) October 13, 2020
Between the two networks, the MWC has eight games on both Thursday and Friday nights, which will help Fox blanket Friday nights after the Big Ten announced several Friday games earlier this week.
Each network also gets four Boise State games (Fox gets the home games, including the non-conference clash with BYU, and CBS gets the road ones), though CBS has five of Air Force’s remaining seven games (including its clash with Army on the CBS broadcast network) and also gets San Diego State five times (to Fox’s one). Hawaii, who fell to Boise State in the MWC Championship last year, appears just once on each network.
Various games will not be on either network, and TV assignments for those games will be announced “in the coming weeks,” per the Mountain West.
All in all if you’re the Mountain West, this was probably about what you expected. The conference is the crown jewel for CBS Sports Network’s football coverage, and clearly falls behind the Big Ten, Big 12, and Pac-12 in Fox’s pecking order. Seeing several games on FS2 has to be disappointing, as does the “Fox or FS1” notation next to the conference’s title game. It’s only one year, but the MWC should hope that it gets better placement on the network in 2021.
