Tuesday, January 25, 2000
Welcome to the late show
UC, XU starting more games deep into the night
BY TOM GROESCHEN
The Cincinnati Enquirer
Call the kids, honey! The Bearcats and Musketeers are coming on!
What's that? Kids asleep? Come to think of it, it's about time to turn in myself ...
With games such as tonight (Xavier at Temple, 9:30 p.m.) and Thursday (Cincinnati at Louisville, 9 p.m.), many fans will be in dreamland by game's end.
Each year, more men's college basketball games seem to start at made-for-TV times of 9 p.m. or later. And UC recently had a midnight tipoff, which has become an annual staple on ESPN.
Is it worth it?
Is the national TV exposure beneficial when, with a midnight game, some fans don't get home till 3 a.m.? Or even for 9/9:30 p.m. games, when the players are bleary-eyed for days thereafter?
“It's not conducive to good academic habits,” XU coach Skip Prosser said. “I just think it's all part of the prevailing power of the tube. There's so much money involved, you play when they ask you to play.”
Tonight, XU will get back to its hotel after midnight. Then the Muskies have an early flight out of Philadelphia on Wednesday, so the players can get to class.
“It's part of the job,” XU guard Maurice McAfee said. “It's something you have to do.”
McAfee said that, after a 9:30 p.m. game, the adrenaline rush can keep players awake until 3 or 4 a.m.
“Then you've got to get up and go to class,” he said. “That's difficult, but it's part of the deal.”
UC coach Bob Huggins has the No.1-ranked team in America but is not averse to midnight games such as Friday, Jan. 14, when a sellout Shoemaker Center crowd watched a victory over Ohio University.
“I think once a year it's great for the students,” Huggins said. “They have such a great time. It tends to be a younger crowd, a more enthusiastic crowd.”
Late starts are not new to college basketball but have grown more prevalent in the last decade. The 9/9:30 p.m. starts often are the nightcap of doubleheader TV presentations, mostly on ESPN and ESPN2.
Here is how things have changed, as UC and XU both have grown in national prominence:
• This season, UC eventually will play 11 games starting at 9 p.m. or later. That is more than one-third of its 30-game schedule.
• In 1991-92, UC's last Final Four season, the Bearcats' latest regular-season starting time was 8:30 p.m. The Bearcats were on ESPN just once that season, having fallen off the national TV map during a 14-year NCAA Tournament drought.
• This season, Xavier will play seven games starting at 9 p.m. or later. In 1995-96, the year XU joined the Atlantic 10, the Muskies had only three games that started at 9 p.m or later.
The Miami RedHawks have no games that start later than 8p.m. this season. One reason is that their Mid-American Conference generally flies below the radar of national TV.
“If someone came to us and said we'd be on ESPN (late), we'd take a good, close look at it,” Miami sports information director Mike Wolf said.
Tom Hathaway, UC's longtime sports information director, said some Bearcat fans skip the midnight or 9:30 p.m. starts, preferring to give tickets to younger acquaintances or family members.
“If you talk to 13,000 people you'll probably have 13,000 different opinions,” Hathaway said. “Some fans enjoy the late games, but some think they're on too late.”
ESPN spokesman Josh Krulewitz said the network devel oped the late night/midnight games as “creative scheduling,” to keep its college basketball presentations fresh.
“We can't force anybody to play at any time,” Krulewitz said. “It's something we work with the schools on. The midnight game has a little sizzle to it, because it's not the traditional time slot.”
UC has had four midnight home games in the past four years, with one of those games being its last home defeat. UC has won 40 straight home games since losing a Preseason NIT midnight game to Arizona State in 1997-98.
Hathaway said UC occasionally seeks out the midnight games. “It gives us an extra exposure, and it also appeals to (alumni and fans and alumni) we have in other parts of the country.”
The late starts also can be good practice for NCAA Tournament games.
“In the tournament, you could have a noon game or you could have a game close to midnight,” Hathaway said.
The NCAA is one thing. The regular season is another.
“I don't think we really care for it,” UC's Jermaine Tate said of the late games. “You just have to come in well-rested.”
“You have to wait all day, sit around,” XU's McAfee said. “You just want to get started.”
Financially, the late games apparently are a wash. ESPN, the schools and the conferences did not have financial figures available but said TV revenue changes yearly, based on ratings points and conference revenue sharing.
“The dollar figures change year to year,” said Brian Teter, Conference USA assistant commissioner. “An ESPN or ABC game brings an additional dollar value than a regionalized telecast, but a midnight game wouldn't bring in any more than, say, a regular Cincinnati-Tulane game.”
Prosser said most coaches and players prefer to play early, to avoid long waits on game day. But he also knows the late games are not going away.
“As long as there's so much money involved,” he said, “it's not going to change.”
— Michael Perry, Scott MacGregor contributed
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