Fans of middling opening-season college football matchups rejoice: Dish Network (NASDAQ: DISH) has resolved a dispute with Fox Sports 1 and will carry four intersectional matchups slated for Labor Day weekend.
"We are proud to deliver the most college football anywhere, at the best possible value," said Dish VP of programming Josh Clark in a statement.
Dish did not disclose the terms of its agreement with the national sports network.
The satellite carrier, which has aggressively promoted its carriage of college-based regional sports networks, announced earlier via corporate blog that it might black out the four games. Dish claimed Fox agreed to pay an "inflated price" to license the games and was passing it along in the form of a surcharge to operators, on top of the carriage fee they already pay Fox Sports 1.
With Dish running funny commercials featuring former college football stars like Brian Bosworth, Heath Schuler and Matt Leinart, and Fox Sports 1 carving a reputation for reasonable carriage fees early on, the near-blackout created perhaps outsized buzz, given the four matchups featured only one team ranked in the Associated Press pre-season top 25 (No. 10 Baylor).
The games are as follows:
- Rutgers vs. Washington State, Aug. 28, 10:00 p.m. ET
- Colorado State vs. Colorado, Aug. 29, 9:00 p.m. ET
- North Dakota State vs. Iowa State, Aug. 30, 12:00 p.m. ET
- SMU vs. Baylor, Aug. 31, 7:30 p.m. ET
For more:
- read this TVPredictions story
Related links:
Dish to black out college football games on Fox Sports 1
SEC Network secures last major carriage deal, Verizon FiOS
Pac-12 commissioner Scott: DirecTV will only negotiate with conglomerates