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PAC-12 CONFERENCE CHAMPIONSHIP GAME: COLORADO VS WASHINGTONDecember 2, 2016Larry ScottSanta Clara, California LARRY SCOTT: Good afternoon, everyone. Delighted to welcome you to 2016 Pac-12 Football Championship game. In for an exciting game later, and this is a great stage for our two teams as we look to crown the Pac-12 Football Champion of 2016. Want to start by congratulating the University of Washington Coach Petersen, University of Colorado Coach MacIntyre on a great season. In some respect, a storybook season, given where those teams have come from over the last few years, and certainly given what people were predicting for the Colorado program, certainly the beginning of the season. It's been very dramatic, competitive season where both teams faced a lot of obstacles along the way. Had to win their rivalry games at the end of the season in order to qualify for the Pac-12 Championship, as well as overcome injuries along the way. So, you know, hard-fought, tough season. A season also where we saw the depth of the conference again. This is a year we've been very strong, and I've certainly seen the depth increasing every year. Last year we saw it with 10 of our 12 teams making bowls, and this year we're a top-heavy conference, which is great. The last two weeks of the College Football Playoff rankings, we had six of the top 25 two weeks ago, and in just this last week, 5 of the top 20 were Pac-12 teams, a quarter of the top 20 were Pac-12 teams. So from my vantage point as commissioner, certainly delighted with the competitiveness and depth of the conference right now. I want to talk a little bit about this game. Certainly recognize our partners that are involved in this. This is our third game here at Levi's Stadium working with the 49ers, City of Santa Clara. It's just an awesome stadium for student-athletes. One of my favorite moments is when the teams arrive for their walkthroughs last night, and just fresh off the bus, and just seeing the players come into the stadium with their phones up in front of their faces videoing what's going on around. This is a really special opportunity for them to play in a venue most of them haven't been to before. It's a really state-of-the-art venue, obviously, home of the 49ers. College Football Playoff has also brought a lot of excitement and interest. I know tonight is going to be special in a lot of respects, not only because of the success and the turnaround over the last few years, which is represented by Colorado and Washington, but the national implications of the game tonight. One of the great things about the playoff and the current structure is that you have the whole country paying attention to what's going to happen here tonight. Our broadcasters at FOX do a great job, and we're expecting a very big audience on television as well as here. The impact of the game is significant to our teams nationally, but one of the recent initiatives of the Pac-12 and College Football Playoff is also to help impact the communities that we play in. This year working with the College Football Playoff Foundation we'll be donating over $120,000, we have donated over $120,000 during the season for the Extra Yard for Teachers program. In fact, just yesterday, a University of Oregon alumnus teacher here in the Santa Clara area was surprised with a check for $10,000 to support her art program in her middle school of 8th graders. That was a pretty cool moment. So the College Football Playoff certainly getting sea legs. We're enjoying being in the community here and trying to give back as well. With the 49ers, this relationship has developed nicely. The last thing I wanted to point to is since we were here last year, it's cemented a deeper relationship with the Foster Farms Bowl, and of course the 2019 National Championship Game will be here at Levi's Stadium in Santa Clara. So we're pleased that the commitment of the 49ers series, the City of Santa Clara around college football getting even deeper, and this venue the site of our championship game is going to play host to the biggest game in college football, the National Championship, in 2019. I'm happy to open it up to any questions that you have. Q. Where are you guys at in terms of Levi's hosting games? LARRY SCOTT: We have one more year. Initially it was a three-year agreement, wound up being turned into a four-year agreement, and so we go through 2017 game and then we'll evaluate. Q. Do you expect to stay here or? LARRY SCOTT: We've been very happy. Very happy with our partnership, happy with the way that it's developed when we started here. I think I said we were coming off three years with the home-hosted model. We had certain advantages and certain challenges. We wanted to try a different model, neutral site model, and the benefits have been significant. But we really haven't gone through the evaluation and decided what we're going to do next, or even talked to the 49ers about it. But we've had a very good experience. Q. A Pac-12 game being played in China recently, what do you anticipate will be the positives of playing a football game in China? LARRY SCOTT: There are definitely pockets of interest amongst our schools and other schools across the country that are interested in playing our teams over in China. We've not advanced those plans up until now because we've decided to really concentrate on basketball and Olympic sports that are endemic to the Chinese, and we've had a good experience. It's developing nicely. Our plans are growing every year there in terms of the partners that we have and the success of the experience for student-athletes and the games. In the meantime, the interest level our schools have in playing football games internationally has peaked. You saw that Cal just had a successful game in Sydney to start the season. So it's very much on the agenda, but, frankly, we've tried to tap the brakes a little bit on football in China because I think it's got some unique challenges, given the fact that it's not endemic to the Chinese. And I would imagine there will be a point in time where we do play a game over there, but I don't have a timetable. Q. (Inaudible)? LARRY SCOTT: Yeah, there are discussions going on about continuing in Australia as well as other markets. Q. You were in Boulder when UCLA (indiscernible). Did you get the sense then that they would have this kind of run to finish the season in them? Secondly, do you think they're worthy of the College Football Playoff should they emerge victorious? LARRY SCOTT: Well, I've been incredibly impressed by Colorado during the season. I don't know that the UCLA game was their finest moment this season, but, yeah, it's been remarkable. They've continued to defy the odds through the season. Really a complete team in all three phases of the game. That's one of the things that's been impressive to me, and I know the folks that have observed them, really incredible leadership in Sefo Liufau, which is oftentimes a signature of a well-seasoned team, making a deep postseason run and having success. If they want to add a lot of hypotheticals, it probably depends on what happens elsewhere. But I certainly feel that they deserve strong consideration for the playoff, regardless of what happens anywhere else. If Colorado were to win, there will be a two-loss champion, or a two-loss team, I should say, in the playoff. I think that's the way the math, under any circumstances, you have a two-loss team. When I look at Colorado's resumé, and I look at not just their wins but their losses, I think it compares favorably to any other two-loss team in the country. Their away losses are to Michigan where they were winning up to the third quarter until Sefo Liufau got knocked out, and that's a factor the committee takes into account. And then away at USC also without Liufau in those big games. So the fact their two losses essentially come to Top 10 teams away without their starting quarterback for the whole game, I don't think there's going to be another team in the country that's got two losses that's got that. But there is still football to play tonight and Saturday, and I do trust the committee is looking at this every which way. They'll give it a thorough analysis. But there is a lot of respect for Colorado. We do have interaction with the committee during the season. I think people are very, very impressed. The other thing I would mention is in terms of the level of respect for Colorado, I was delighted to see Mike MacIntyre win the Walter Camp Coach of the Year. That doesn't happen (indiscernible) throughout the country, watching, paying attention, and really admiring what a program's doing, especially when a team bursts onto the national scene of elite teams like they did this year. So, yeah, I feel good they'll get full consideration. Q. Along those lines, the committee, if I understand correctly, has said that after the four best teams. Do you think that the committee has tapped down the importance of a conference championship team like this one, and if so, what is your reaction? LARRY SCOTT: I have no reason to believe that they've de-emphasized the importance of conference champion. I think it's one of the most important criteria. I think, as we all do, you're looking carefully to the chairman of the committee and the weekly press conferences, I think, probably every week mentions an important factor is conference champion, and keep in mind, that's not weighed in yet. We've seen in years past the rankings have some significant change at the end after the conference champion is weighed in. So, no, I think it's a critical factor. When we designed the College Football Playoff and the selection criteria, there was a lot of debate about whether winning a conference championship should be a requirement, a gating issue in the playoffs. There should only be four conference champions. That wound up not being the prevailing view. We decided there could be circumstances. While it's important, there could be circumstances where you have a non-champion be in the playoff, but they would have to unequivocally -- you've heard that word. They would have to unequivocally be one of the best four teams in the country. So I think what you've heard is certainly no different from how I've understood it, which is the teams (indiscernible) are going to be conference champions, unless there (indiscernible) teams that are unequivocally in the top four. Q. Your position at the time of the original debate? LARRY SCOTT: I argued for conference champions only, but that was not the prevailing view. But we reached a great compromise. I was satisfied at the end of the day given the caliber of the committee and the rigor they were going to put into the process, as long as they were going to put a heavy weighting on winning the conference championship, I was satisfied. And the reason that was important to me is there aren't enough data points. There's not enough cross-conference competition amongst enough teams to really have an appropriate measure of how strong one conference is against another. So credit ought to go to teams that win something, that earn something. Yeah, obviously that's where we met it out. Q. Given the fact that that's still up in the air, whether conference champions are going to be given preference, wouldn't an eight-team playoff solve a lot of that? LARRY SCOTT: Yeah, the thing that would be most appealing, depending on your judgment, of course, but certainly an appealing aspect I should say of an eight-team playoff would be auto-bids for the champions from the five conferences and then some at-large system for the remaining three. That would give certainty to the Pac-12 that we're going to have a team in the playoff every year. It would take away a lot of this controversy and drama. Although it would still be debated about who is going to get the remaining at-large spots. Yeah, the flip side of that debate has been it's an extra game, unless you're going to do away with Conference Championship Games, immediately, given contracts and other things, it'd be an extra game student-athletes, it would diminish the bowls. Right? We're going to have an amazing Rose Bowl this year. It's one of three teams that are really great teams that are going to be in there for the Pac-12. A really good Big Ten team. Move to an eight-team playoff, and in all likelihood the quality of the match-ups of that game is going to be diminished, particularly for the Pac-12 and I think the Big Ten as well. We place high value on a 100-year tradition that we have for the Rose Bowl, and we want to keep it an elite game. This trickle-down affects the whole bowl system. So the calendar reasons, a variety of reasons, they thought that four is the right number, even though it's going to create some more controversy, some more judgment around the committee. Q. I want to make sure I understand correctly, are you staying with four? LARRY SCOTT: Yeah, it's important to stay with four. I think we've got the right balance. Q. I'd like to jump to a different topic if I could. Pac-12 Networks we're hearing are generating something like 1.5 million for each school, something like that, and that's quite a bit less than some athletic directors were expecting. Quite a bit less than the SEC schools and Big Ten schools are getting from their networks. Is there any way out of this or any way to improve? What do you say to frustrated athletic directors? Is there anyway to generate more money out of the Pac-12 Network? LARRY SCOTT: Yeah, well, the network has improved every year, increased their number of distributors, the revenue. It's been profitable from year one, and it's providing tremendous benefits from an exposure standpoint, not just for football and basketball, but Olympic sports. It's really meeting all of the objectives we had when we set out to launch it in the first place, in 2011, year-round at the time. We announced the network on the heels of our blockbuster ESPN and FOX deal, which generated multiples of the revenue we had before. And the network was primarily that exposure at the time. It wasn't -- well, financial returns are always important, but that was not the primary motivation at all of creating the network. So to answer the first part of your question, it's meeting or exceeding any initial objectives that we had for it. Having said that, we're in a very competitive dynamic with other conferences. And the fact that a couple years into the Pac-12 Network the SEC expanded their conference, created their TV deal and started a network which has been incredibly successful definitely gets our attention, gets the schools' attention, the fact that the Big Ten has recently redone their TV deal. So we are laser focused on any way that we can help the schools generate more income. We're locked into 12-year deals through 2024 with ESPN and FOX, on the one hand, and with our key distributors, so there are not going to be any major changes to the structure of our TV networks, but there are definitely ways to continue to grow the performance. There's a few distributors, some you're aware of, that we don't currently have, and we're hopeful that we will get those distributors and continue to do better on advertising and have it grow. But we're focused on what our original plan was, and we'll do everything we can to try to generate more revenue for the schools. Q. I want to make sure I get this straight. I know in terms of getting exposure for the sports, I get all that, but you said that you have met the expectations of the schools? LARRY SCOTT: From our original business plan. Expectations change. I'm well aware of that, and that's fine. But from when we set out to do the network, it's overachieved what we initially thought it might. But I'm not going to tell you right now people are satisfied. We want to stay competitive. We'd love to be generating the same revenue if not more revenue than the Big Ten or SEC. So I certainly don't want you to take my comments suggesting anyone's complacent or anyone's satisfied. We're striving for more, for sure. Those two things can exist. We could have done better than we thought we'd do, but the landscape's changed. Q. There is the new field storming rule in place this year. We've seen it in Boulder a few times. Kind of a two-part question. One earlier this week, the second and third events in Boulder were still under review. Is there any verdict on that? And the other side of it, is there anything more (indiscernible) want to see schools like CU do to curtail it? Like the game last week Rick George was on the video board making announcements, leaving. Short of physically restraining people, is there anything more you'd like to see schools try to curb it? LARRY SCOTT: Yeah, there is a new rule this year that was heavily debated within the conference. And we're implementing it. This might be in the basket, Rick would consider, good problems to have because of the success they've had, and the number of instances of field storms that they've had. But I don't -- to answer the first part of your question, I don't think we've ultimately determined what's happening on some of the more recent ones. But I will say that I've been very impressed with the way the University of Colorado is trying to address the issue, address the spirit of what we're trying to achieve, which is really all about health and safety of the players, the coaches, the officials, and the fans themselves. We're trying to avoid a tragic situation from potentially happening or other types of injuries. So we do believe, I think, the underlying philosophy in creating rules, it is something that you can affect. We've seen other conferences that have this policy that have issued fines over the years do away with it, except the occasional instance. So we do think through communication, through proactive measures, changing the culture, security, operations there are various things you can do to try to address it. It takes time. I'll tell you a quick thing that I -- tell you how seriously Rick George -- when I was at the Colorado-UCLA game, I was up in Rick's suite at the end of the game saying hello to his guests and stuff. The game's coming to an end. He called me over and he whipped out his phone with his timer on. He said, This is what I do at the end of any game. And we watched together as the game ended, and he pressed start on his stopwatch to see if they'd make it to a minute before anyone came on the field. That happened to have been a game where there wasn't any storming that happened within a minute. But it really, you know, made a strong statement to me that something at the top Rick is very focused on and he's working on. It's certainly noted that he was in the stands. He's talking to student leaders. So I think they're taking impressive steps. Nonetheless, we've got a clear rule and we're enforcing it. Q. To maybe clarify one aspect of the rule. Hypothetically there was court storming in the CU basketball game this year. Does that stay at the $100,000 multi (indiscernible), or does it kick back to the first offense, 25 grand for -- as a new venue? LARRY SCOTT: I have to check. I'm not 100%, and I don't want to give you the wrong answer. But it is, of course, implemented for basketball as well as football. But I'll have to get back to you on that. Q. The network you mentioned with the Big Ten (indiscernible). How much exploration has there been for the Pac-12 to have a similar partnership? LARRY SCOTT: Yeah, we evaluated various different models when we launched the network. When we agreed to do a network in 2011 and struck our business deals with Comcast, Time Warner, Cox, and Bright House, and we're regularly evaluating the market and have talked to partners. So it's something we're always keeping an eye on and from time to time we've done a bit of a deeper dive with the model. At this point in time we feel like in our situation, the model we have is the best situation for us, at the moment, given the options that we have. Q. (Indiscernible)? LARRY SCOTT: Well, having complete control, being masters of your own destiny in terms of how you program, what you want to invest in programs. For example, we program 850 live events on linear television. I think the next highest any other conference has is 450. We invest a lot back in exposing more Olympic sports than other networks. The quality of our production, our studio shows, shows like "The Drive," these are all decisions we make based on our values, our priorities, and what we're trying to put forward. When you have a partner, you're less in control of making those decisions. And you also have all the benefit and risk financially and otherwise with it. So it's a risk-reward profile. So there is a certain level of nimbleness that we have, and we're trying to take advantage of that with some of the things we're doing with Twitter and Facebook Live and others, especially being out here in this part of the world. We very much see the world of content distribution, being very dynamic, changing very rapidly, and we happen to have a lot of leading tech companies that are going to be players in live video and live sports video distribution where our alumni are a lot of the leaders in this part of the world, and we think our nimbleness and control will benefit us going forward. Lastly, I mentioned 2024, seems like a long way away on the one hand. On the other hand, it will be here soon. By not committing to a third party when we redo what I refer to as our tier 1 rights, we'll also be able to take a complete fresh look at what we want to do with the network and what we do with our content. In the other two cases, when you take on a partner like that, in most instances you have to commit your rights for 25 years, which means you will not have an opportunity in the near term to take a step back and figure out do networks make sense, what type of conference do want on your network versus tier 1. Tough to place a value on that sitting here right now in 2016, but I can tell you that will be incredibly valuable. Q. Is your expectation that Washington will be in the playoff? LARRY SCOTT: It's hard for me to imagine a scenario where they wouldn't. But going through the category of hypotheticals, I don't know what's going to happen during the game and what's going to happen to other games. But given that they're ranked No. 4, and if they win the game they'll have beaten a Top 10 team and have the designation conference champion that we talked about before, those are all -- those are two things that will happen if they win that will propel them. It's hard for me to imagine that they would drop. Q. Are there any discussions with DirecTV? I know you probably get tired of answering this. LARRY SCOTT: I don't mind answering it. It's a top, top priority, and internally we're focused on it all the time. There are regular discussions that go on to see if there's any new momentum, but up until now there hasn't been any momentum around this conversation. So no optimism I can give you sitting here today right now. But it's a very dynamic, fast-changing landscape. Lot of new competitors. Their business is changing all the time, so long-term I'm very optimistic where we sit. Thank you. Enjoy the game. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports   |
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