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By Jimmy Robertson

CHARLOTTE, N.C. – ACC Commissioner John Swofford and ESPN President John Skipper announced Thursday the launching of the much-anticipated ACC Network at the league’s ACC Football Kickoff media event being held at the Westin Hotel in Charlotte.

The multi-platform network will launch in two phases. This fall, the league will launch “ACC Network Extra” on ESPN3 and WatchESPN through the ESPN app, allowing fans to watch more than 600 exclusive ACC sporting events.

Then in 2019, the league will launch a dedicated television channel, with programming dedicated to the ACC 24 hours a day, seven days a week. The deal runs through the 2035-36 season. Financial details were not released.

“There is no question that these new agreements position the Atlantic Coast Conference for the long term,” Swofford said. “Both from a financial perspective and from a programming, content and exposure perspective. It would be an understatement to say that ESPN is the leading provider of sports content and we appreciate their understanding of the value of the ACC’s programming and the vibrant markets throughout our current footprint as well as their commitment to this league. I think this agreement provides growth opportunities for both parties.”

Virginia Tech AD Whit Babcock attended the event and expressed excitement over what the announcement and the coming of the long-awaited network means for the Hokies’ future.

“It’s a great day to be undefeated in football and start a television network,” Babcock said. “In athletics, we so often take success and say, ‘Great. What’s the next issue?’ Today, I thought it would be good stop and smell the roses. It’s a great day to celebrate. For me, having been around and moved around a lot, the stability of this league is exciting. It’s dynamic. It’s just a great day to be a part of the ACC.”

Swofford said that the ACC Network Extra initially would be available to 90 million subscribers. It would be the platform for 600 live games in year No. 1 and that number would grow to 900 live events by 2019.

In 2019, the television channel will broadcast 450 live events, including 40 football games and 150 men’s and women’s basketball games annually. The ACC expects to show more than 250 regular-season contests and tournament games from across the conference’s 27 sponsored sports, again, on an annual basis.

Combined, more than 1,300 ACC events will be televised on an annual basis through one of these platforms.

“Delivering this content to our fans, our alums, and our student-athletes as well as their families and friends was a driving force in our discussions,” Swofford said. “We know that cumulatively ACC football and men’s basketball delivers more viewers on an annual basis for ESPN than any other conference. Having fans that follow our schools and our conference at this level is a positive indicator of the overall popularity of our content.”

Such an arrangement figures to be a huge boon to Olympic sports, which tend to receive less attention and coverage compare to football and basketball.

“I think it benefits sports like wrestling and other Olympic sports more,” said Kevin Dresser, Tech’s wrestling coach, who also attended the announcement. “I’m sure from a dollars and cents standpoint that it makes a big impact with football and basketball, but just for exposure and increasing our fan base and recruiting and kids getting to be on TV – it’s a huge deal.

“Kids want to be on TV and that’s brought up. Big Ten wrestling is on TV, and now, the ACC has taken a step to make us competitive at the highest level. The Big Ten is the predominant wrestling conference, but this helps put us on the same playing field now.”

The ACC also announced that Raycom would continue to be the league’s regional network until the ACC Network is launched in 2019.

Probably the biggest surprise of the day came when the league announced that it would be moving to a 20-game conference schedule for men’s basketball in 2019, coinciding with the launch of the linear channel. The league had been at 18.

Here is a brief Q&A with Babcock about the ACC Network and its impact on Virginia Tech athletics:

Q: How is this beneficial to Virginia Tech?

WB: “Visibility, recruiting, finances, being a leader among the Power Five conferences … I feel like we’ve separated ourselves. There are a lot of reasons why this is important.”

Q: How much money do you expect Virginia Tech to receive from this arrangement?

WB: “It’s too early to tell. A lot of that will depend on distribution and things of that nature. They’ve asked us not to speculate on that, but it will be more than we currently receive.”

Q: Will you need to build production facilities for broadcasts and how much will this cost?

WB: “Yes. That is a part of it and ESPN was forthcoming with that. All schools will have to do this in some manner. At Virginia Tech, we’re a little ahead of the game. We learned a lot from our SEC peers and I’ve talked with some of them.

“It could be a big range to get the studios up and running. If I had to ballpark it, it could be between $1-$5 million or $2-$6 million depending on your capabilities. When you take that over the length of the deal, the money is well worth it. For us at Virginia Tech, it will give a great learning laboratory for our communications students. So there is a lot of cross collaboration with campus, too.”

Q: What was Buzz Williams’ reaction to playing 20 conference games?

WB: “We talked a little about that. He was good with it. He certainly had an opinion on the subject. But strength of schedule is a big deal and he was receptive to it. He understands the big picture. For us, we’ll have to look at scheduling. Maybe we won’t do as many buy games, so that’s a benefit. Buzz was happy.”

Q: Will the league go to nine conference football games?

WB: “The commissioner didn’t touch on that because I don’t believe anything has changed at this point. We will re-visit football scheduling at the fall meetings, like we always do. But there is no determination to change off of what we have right now.”

Q: Will the league keep the ACC-Big Ten Challenge?

WB: “I hope. I honestly don’t know. It’s been a while since we’ve talked about that. My recollection is that we had talked about keeping that. I’d love to keep it. I think it’s great for the fans and drawing attention after football season.”

Q: Why is the league waiting until 2019 to launch the network?

WB: “Good question. There was a lot of discussion on that. From the infrastructure aspect and the distribution aspect, maybe the timetable could have been sped up, but at the end of the day, let’s get it right. We’re only going to have one shot at this, so a little delayed gratification was a good strategy and the right thing.”

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