MORGANTOWN, W.Va. — WVU Athletics Director Shane Lyons says he realizes there are going to “growing pains” with five Mountaineer basketball games appearing on the digital streaming platform ESPN+ between now and the end of the season.
The first one of those games comes Saturday afternoon when the 16th-ranked Mountaineers take on No. 5 Kansas. WVU fans will only be able to view the game if they subscribe to the service through espn.com. It costs $4.99 for a month-long subscription.
Lyons said the Big 12 presidents and athletic directors decided to work with ESPN to promote the ESPN+ before the conference negotiates a new television contract expected in 2024.
“The numbers keep growing on the digital platform,” Lyons said recently during an appearance on MetdroNews “Talkline.” “That’s one of the reasons that as presidents and athletic directors we looked at ESPN+ as a viable option for the future.”
The Big 12 Conference games set for ESPN+ this season landed on places like ESPN 2, ESPN News or ESPN-U last year. Lyons said it wasn’t long ago when ESPN-U only had 15 million viewers, now it has 70 million. He said the same growth may be possible for ESPN+ on the digital platform.
“We feel that ESPN+ has a lot of room for growth. It’s just a different opportunity and platform to look at. We were trying to make a long-term decision understanding there would be growing pains with that,” Lyons said.
He admitted broadband coverage in parts of West Virginia can be spotty but he expressed hope that situation would also improve in the years ahead.
“We have roughly 1.8 million people, 1.4 million of them have the streaming capabilities. We understand hopefully that’s going to continue to climb higher and everyone is going to have the streaming capabilities as we move into the future,” Lyons said.
WVU’s third-tier broadcasting rights move to ESPN+ next season, meaning most non-conference games will be on that platform. A few conference schools have already made the move to ESPN+ with their third-tier rights.
WVU’s game at Kansas tips-off at 4 p.m. Saturday. Other games scheduled for ESPN+ this season include the Jan. 28 game at Texas Tech; Feb. 12 game in Morgantown against Kansas; Feb. 15 at Baylor and the March 7 Baylor game in Morgantown.