With March Madness just around the corner, ESPN has been warming up college basketball fans since last week with a slate of some 200 live conference tournament games using a syndicated ESPN3 player on Facebook.
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ESPN will show tournament games via its ESPN3 player on Facebook. |
Teams and conferences will also be able to display the ESPN3 player on their official fan pages to highlight live games for their fans. Replays of recently concluded events will be available as well.
For users who receive ESPN3 through an affiliated Internet service provider, the player will be able to automatically identify them as an authenticated user.
With the play, ESPN joins several other sports leagues in providing live contents on the social media site.
In November, Nascar.com and ESPN provided a live Facebook stream of the Ford 400 from a camera inside Tony Stewart's car; in August, Facebook streamed a live FA Cup preliminary round soccer match between British clubs Ascot United and Wembley FC, and last year it streamed some MLB Spring training games.
The network is available at no cost to approximately 21 million U.S. college students and U.S.-based military personnel via computers connected to on-campus educational networks and on-base military networks. It is also accessible through ESPN on Xbox Live to Gold members and on smartphones and tablets via the WatchESPN app through an affiliated provider.
For more:
- see this L.A. Times article
- see this release
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