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The Big Ten announced the television schedule the upcoming 2017-18 conference season yesterday.
In a release from the Big Ten Network, BTN will air more than 75 conference matchups this season and at least 49 additional non-conference games. The network will also cover the first ten games of the Big Ten Tournament, airing the first two rounds and quarterfinals.
BTN’s conference coverage will kick off at the beginning of December with Purdue playing at Maryland, followed by Illinois at Northwestern.
In a release from the Big Ten conference, the league also announced television designations for the rest of the conference schedule, as well as a number of non-conference games.
Big Ten basketball will be spread around quite a bit this winter, with games set to predominantly air on BTN, CBS Sports, ESPN and Fox Sports. The above release includes television information for all games currently set for BTN, CBS Sports, an ESPN network (ESPN, ESPN2, ESPNU), Fox, FS1 and BTN Plus.
A few other tidbits to come from yesterday’s announcement is that with BTN covering the first three rounds of the Big Ten Tournament, ESPN won’t air any of the tournament this season. Like in previous years, CBS will air both the semifinals and championship game.
The Gavitt Tipoff Games and Big Ten / ACC Challenge won’t have their TV information announced until a later date, but the networks set for each set of games was announced. The Gavitt Tipoff Games, which matches Big Ten and Big East opponents, will air on FS1 or BTN. The Big Ten / ACC Challenge will air entirely across an ESPN network like it has in the past.
With the season just over two months away, it makes sense that television information is now available for a majority of the games. This year will be a different with the addition of Fox Sports, but now we have a decent picture of how the conference will be covered this upcoming season.