Don’t call it a comeback. Or a relaunch. Or really the start of anything new, per se.
Whatever it is, though, ESPN’s men’s college basketball Saturday this week following the CFP is loaded, and the network is gearing up for the jam-packed weekend.
“It is sort of the first big weekend when things start to become more basketball-focused,” said Dan Margulis, ESPN’s senior director/programming and acquisitions. “... Any time you're scheduling stuff that far out, you're anticipating certain things and the stories that emerge. Some of them are there. Some of them change, right? And what's great about this day is we're sort of partly built to adjust to that, but also stories emerged.”
This week’s slate includes matchups between No. 5 Florida vs. No. 8 Tennessee, No. 11 Kansas vs. Baylor, No. 1 Auburn vs. No. 23 Ole Miss and UNC vs. No. 2 Duke. That also doesn’t include John Calipari’s return to Lexington when Arkansas takes on Kentucky, or the nightcap between Gonzaga and St. Mary’s that tips off at 11pm ET.
UNC-Duke is perennially one of the top draws in college hoops (last season, the pair of matchups were Nos. 2 and 3, respectively, for men’s college basketball). ESPN is also coming off a strong performance last weekend, as Tennessee-Auburn (1.74 million viewers) delivered the fifth-best college hoops game this season across all networks, and Houston’s double OT comeback thriller over Kansas (1.69 million) is No. 7 overall.
The games themselves are a draw -- that many top 25 matchups, and a ratings monster in UNC-Duke, will do that (last week's Tennessee-Auburn and Houston-Kansas, for example, both drew north of 1.65 million and peaked at 2 million-plus).
ESPN, too, is adding to the fervor with “College GameDay” broadcasting from Duke ahead of the matchup between the Tar Heels and Blue Devils.
“It's an insane day,” Margulis said. “I'll be in Durham, but I'm going to be watching most of the games on my phone or whatever I can do. We knew going into the season this was going to be sort of our ‘Relaunch.’ ... It really sets it off right and we're excited for it.”
