Campus Clips: ESPN Lacrosse Coverage Includes ESPNU Wednesday Game of the Week; Ball State Sports Link Releases Spring Production Plans

Compiled by Brandon Costa, Senior Editor, Sports Video Group

ESPN’s 2013 college lacrosse schedule features an increase in games, plus the debut of the ESPNU Wednesday Men’s Lacrosse Game of the Week. This year’s coverage includes 53 total games – 44 regular season, 46 men’s and seven women’s – including the crowning of the ACC, Big East, America East, and Ivy League tournament champions. All ESPNU programming will be available on computers at WatchESPN.com and on smartphones and tablets via the WatchESPN app to fans who receive their video subscription from an affiliated provider. Play begins on Feb. 8 with Siena facing No. 6 Johns Hopkins at 5 p.m. on ESPNU…

…Ball State Sports Link will coordinate more than 100 live events and sports programs during the 2013 spring semester. The events, which do not include SL’s daily updates and feature stories, focus on cross-platform production featuring radio broadcasts, television remotes with the University’s 40-foot HD production truck, studio shows on a virtual set and digital publishing to iPad applications.

The schedule is highlighted by 16 television productions starting Jan. 12 with BSU men’s basketball vs. Kent State. The SL TV schedule also includes women’s basketball, men’s volleyball and softball live events – all airing on campus, locally and across the state of Indiana on Comcast 81. Select live events will also be distributed nationally to Fox College Sports.

Ball State Sports Link’s monthly, all-sports magazine show “Be A Fan” also returns in 2013 with five shows running January through May on WIPB-TV, Comcast Indiana 81 and Fox College Sports. Seniors Kevin Thurman and Brad Dailey, with seniors Josh Blessing and Ashley Reed as hosts, produce the show.

Ball State Sports Link will also become the official media home for BSU softball in 2013 with as many as 15 contests – home and away—to be produced by SL Radio or SL TV. Softball coverage begins March 19…

…The Rose and Sugar bowls will host the first semifinal games when college football’s four-team playoff begins in the 2014 season, the Bowl Championship Series conference commissioners announced after a meeting Tuesday. Those bowls, with tie-ins to the Big Ten and Pac-12 and Big 12 and Southeastern conferences, respectively, will also remain anchored to New Year’s Day, except when it falls on a Sunday. The Orange Bowl and two of three “host” bowls will often be played on New Year’s Eve…