Network will be Live 10 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Daily; Debuts Two New Studio Shows
ESPNU’s 2012 college football programming begins Monday, Aug. 27 and includes the debut of two live studio shows in addition to the return of more than 15 weekly programs. As a result, the network will be live every day from 10 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. ET and have more than 47 hours of original show programming in a typical week.
“There is no shortage of content in college sports, which is why ESPN launched the network seven years ago,” said Dan Margulis, senior director, ESPNU programming and acquisitions. “With live shows during the morning, afternoon and late evening we have an opportunity in every daypart to keep fans updated with the latest news. We are able to say ‘college football lives here, every day on ESPNU’ and have a full roster of programming to back it up.”
Each weeknight will be capped off with the network’s new live late-night show UNITE airing at midnight beginning Monday, Aug. 27. CFB Daily – hosted by ESPNU’s Dari Nowkhah, rotating college football analysts and sports business reporter Darren Rovell – is also new to the mix beginning Monday and will air the latest news and analysis each day from 1-4 p.m.
ESPNU will now feature more than six hours of back-to-back live programming beginning at 10 a.m. with ESPN Radio’s The Herd with Colin Cowherd (10 a.m.- 1 p.m.), CFB Daily (1-4 p.m.) and College Football Live (4- 4:30 p.m.).
This year’s live weekday college football line-up has nearly doubled the number of live hours on the network and increased the number of original programming hours from 31 to 47. Those numbers do not include Saturday’s slate of up to four live college football games and additional live weeknight events such as NCAA Olympic sports, HBCU Thursday night football games and Friday night high school football.
In addition to the four daily live shows – The Herd, CFB Daily, College Football Live and UNITE – ESPNU’s weekly original programming will include:
| Day of the Week | Time (ET) | ESPNU Show |
| Monday | 4:30 – 5 p.m. | Final Verdict |
| 5 – 6 p.m. | Crunch Time | |
| 6 – 7 p.m. | ESPNU BCS Countdown | |
| Tuesday | 2:30 – 4 p.m. | The Experts |
| 4:30 – 5 p.m. | College Football Featured | |
| 7-7:30 p.m. | ESPNU All-Access | |
| 7:30 – 8 p.m. | ESPNU Road Trip | |
| Wednesday | 4:30 – 5 p.m. | Big 12 This Week |
| Thursday | 4:30 – 5 p.m. | ESPNU Film Room |
| 5 -6 p.m. | ESPN Recruiting Nation | |
| 10:30 p.m. – midnight | SportsCenterU | |
| Friday | 5:30 – 6 p.m. | First Take: College Football |
| Saturday | 9 – 10 a.m. | ESPN College GameDay Built by the Home Depot |
| 10 a.m. – 11 a.m. | SportsNation: College Football | |
| 11 a.m. – noon | College Football Whiparound |
ESPNU College Football Show Highlights:
- Final Verdict (Mon., 4:30-5 p.m.): a half-hour spin-off of the weekly segment on CFB Final with Lou Holtz, Mark May, and Rece Davis. Holtz and a variety of contributors cast judgments on the weekend’s football action.
- Crunch Time (Mon., 5-6 p.m.): each show looks back at the last minutes of the best college football games from the previous week, packaged into a one-hour program.
- ESPNU BCS Countdown (Mon., 6-7 p.m.): the hour-long live studio show, hosted by Nowkhah, discusses the ever-changing college football standings. ESPN’s Mike Bellotti, Tom Luginbill and Kevin Carter will share analyst responsibilities.
- The Experts (Tue. 2:30-4 p.m.): the weekly 90-minute studio show rotates in top college football guests bringing fans intelligent conversation and debate every Tuesday.
- College Football Featured (Tue., 4:30 -5 p.m.): looks back at the week’s most compelling features with clips from College GameDay, SportsCenter and other ESPN shows surrounding the game of college football.
- ESPNU All-Access (Tue., 7-7:30 p.m.): takes fans inside the nation’s leading college football programs each week for an all-access pass to practices, player meetings and tours of the campus.
- ESPNU Road Trip (Tue., 7:30- 8 p.m.): a 30-minute weekly series which taps into the tradition, rivalry and revelry from college campuses that are synonymous with the college football experience.
- ESPNU Film Room (Thu., 4:30- 5 p.m.): goes inside the gameplan of the week’s top matchups, with ESPN’s own leading playmakers walking you through the Xs & Os.
- ESPN Recruiting Nation (Thu,. 5-6 p.m.): a weekly hour-long studio show to discuss high school football players and their future impact on the college scene, as well as provide inside information and recruiting news. The show will include analysis from Luginbill and Craig Haubert, in addition to information from ESPN.com‘s 14 school sites.
About ESPNU
The 24-hour college sports television network airs more than 650 live events annually and offers over 600 original studio shows. ESPNU has seen a steady increase since its inception on March 4, 2005 and is now in over 73 million households. The brand is also available in high definition on ESPNUHD, now in over 20 million homes. The network has long-term carriage agreements with all 10 of the top multichannel TV providers – Cablevision, Charter, Comcast, Cox, DirecTV (Channel 208), DISH Network (Channel 141), Mediacom, Time Warner Cable, Verizon FiOS TV and AT&T U-verse.
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