Believe it or not, college hoops season is less than a month away. And if you thought shifting television deals were exclusive to college football, you’d be wrong.
In recent years, college basketball has experienced its fair share of media change, and at the forefront of that change may be the number of games transitioning from linear television to streaming exclusives.
NBC/Peacock undoubtedly leads the way with its Big Ten media rights deal. Peacock will be the exclusive home to over 50 Big Ten men’s basketball games this season. That’s nearly double the 30-odd games exclusive to the streaming service last season. Each school will make at least two appearances on the streamer, but others are making much more.
.@peacock is the exclusive home of 75+ @bigten Men’s and Women’s basketball games for the 2024-25 season.
Details and full schedules here:https://t.co/WsHnjIiJWp
— NBC Sports PR (@NBCSportsPR) October 9, 2024
Wisconsin leads the way in Peacock exclusives, appearing on the service a whopping 11 times during the 2024-25 season. Purdue, Northwestern, and Penn State follow Wisconsin, playing in seven Peacock-exclusive games this season. Indiana, Michigan State, and Rutgers clock in at six games apiece.
No doubt, picking schools like Wisconsin, Purdue, Indiana, and Michigan State with rabid basketball followings played into the equation for NBC when selecting its schedule. Last season, only one school, Purdue, had more than five Peacock-exclusive games. The majority of the conference had fewer than four.
In addition to the regular season contests, Peacock will once again exclusively air the first round of the Big Ten Tournament, including three games instead of two after the conference’s expansion.
Big Ten women’s basketball will also get more Peacock exposure, with the streamer broadcasting over 20 games this upcoming season. USC, with superstar JuJu Watkins, will make a conference-high eight appearances on Peacock, with Indiana and UCLA clocking in at six each.
The expansion of Big Ten inventory on Peacock shows NBC’s continuing commitment to making the streaming service a premier destination for live sports. The company has not been shy about putting marquee sporting events, from NFL games to Notre Dame football games to the Premier League, the Olympics, and more, exclusively behind the Peacock paywall.
The strategy seems to be working, with the service reportedly attracting 2.8 million new subscribers over the first week of the Paris Olympics this summer. The streamer’s exclusive NFL Wild Card game in January attracted a similar figure, and the company claims churn has been lower than expected.
Given the success of its strategy thus far, why stop now? As college basketball season quickly approaches, finding a Wisconsin fan without a Peacock subscription will likely prove difficult. And that’s exactly what NBC wants.
About Drew Lerner
Drew Lerner is a staff writer for Awful Announcing and an aspiring cable subscriber. He previously covered sports media for Sports Media Watch. Future beat writer for the Oasis reunion tour.