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BIG TEN CONFERENCE FOOTBALL MEDIA DAYS

July 18, 2019

Francois McGillicuddy

Chicago, Illinois

FRANCOIS McGILLICUDDY: Good morning, everyone. I wanted to start with that clip because as a network, those 90 seconds encapsulate the excitement that comes with the start of the football season and what we at BTN are striving to deliver. We are responsible for representing all Big Ten institutions across more than 40 games and over 750 hours of programming during all 14 weeks of the Big Ten regular season.

To do that, our focus will be on three things: Production of quality live games, compelling storytelling about the Big Ten Conference, and the most expert Big Ten analysis. If we can do those three things exceptionally well day in and day out, I have no doubt that BTN will continue to be a network that Big Ten fans, our schools, and the Conference can be proud of.

I should start by saying and letting you know that my name is Francois McGillicuddy. I start with that because I know that's what many of you are thinking, "is that really his name", so I'll get that question out of the way. French mom and an Irish dad from Brooklyn will do it to you every time.

As the introduction says, I spent the last six years as the general manager of FOX Sports Ohio and Sports Time Ohio overseeing our production of Cleveland Indians and Cincinnati Reds baseball, Cleveland Cavaliers basketball and Columbus Blue Jackets hockey.

Building relationships with our teams was one of the highlights of that job for me, and I'm approaching my job here at BTN in a similar fashion as we work with our schools. So far, I've been really invigorated by that process as one of the primary reasons I took this job was to work with the Big Ten conference and to remain in the FOX Sports family.

We're talking about two of the most highly-regarded entities in the sports landscape with the Big Ten as the premier conference in the nation, and FOX Sports as the leader in live sports and events. And so I'm proud to play a part in continuing to build the connection between those two organizations.

In BTN, they come to form the partnership within the conference network landscape. In the last year, BTN has produced nearly 1,900 events, with an equal number of women's and men's events. That covers 28 varsity sports. And the way we produce our Olympic sports events is, at least to me, the best case study on how unique a venture this is.

A large portion of our productions involve the Student U initiative, which is a program designed to open doors for Big Ten students who are interested in a career in sports or broadcasting. In fact, last year Student U produced over 700 events, with more than 500 students participating across the entire Big Ten conference. The program has been in existence since 2009, and in that time, over 3,000 students have graduated from Student U, with many going on to work at BTN, FOX Sports, or elsewhere in the industry. And this is all possible due to the support we receive from both FOX Sports and the Big Ten Conference, and embodies what a conference network should strive to deliver.

I should say this morning that it's somewhat bittersweet for me that, as I begin my Big Ten career, Commissioner Delany is in the process of ending his. In our short time together, Jim has been exceptionally generous with his knowledge and time. Over 31 years, he leaves a legacy that is respected and admired by everyone in the sports world, and his leadership will remain the standard by which we are judged. We like to think a part of that legacy involves our network as BTN wouldn't exist without his vision and conviction. I think everyone would agree, the Big Ten Conference is better off for knowing Jim Delany, and I'd like to join many of my colleagues in saying, thank you.

I'm looking forward to learning as much as I possibly can from Jim through the remainder of his tenure and beyond.

And now as I think about my own role and responsibilities, I was also struck by Kevin Warren's comments last month during his introduction as the next commissioner of the Big Ten Conference. He discussed embracing the difficulties associated with replacing a tremendous leader while simultaneously being excited by the opportunities that come from that challenge.

His words so accurately captured my own feelings as I reflected on replacing the only president that BTN has ever known, and my desire to continue the network's momentum. I can't tell you how enthusiastic I am to have someone of Kevin's character and abilities stepping in as commissioner, and our entire team at BTN will work to support him in representing the Big Ten.

On a similar note, the momentum of BTN could be attributed in large part to Mark Silverman, who was the network's first and only president for 12 years and did an incredible job in launching and managing the Big Ten Network, which brings me to providing an update on BTN.

With regard to our distribution, we feel good about where BTN is currently situated. Despite the fact that there has been industry subscriber erosion, the newer digital entrants continue to capture a greater share of the market and offset a significant portion of traditional pay TV losses. Part of our strength as a network is our alumni base, which is situated from coast to coast. There are over 5.7 million Big Ten alumni, and when you consider how that extends to families or households or even fans and families who follow but didn't include a graduate from the Big Ten school, we're talking about tens of millions of people following close to 1,900 live events produced by BTN.

As the first collegiate network to be distributed internationally, we are currently in more than 60 million homes with carriage by all major video distributors, including Charter Spectrum, Comcast XFINITY, Cox Communications, DirecTV, Dish, AT&T U-verse, and Verizon Fios. BTN is also available through all virtual multichannel programming distributors with a sports offering, including DirecTV Now, Hulu Live TV, PlayStation Vue, and YouTube TV. This widespread availability should come as good news to our fans as we're positioned to deliver a strong season of football programming.

We're pleased with our preliminary schedule, which was announced back in May. For the first time in network history, BTN will broadcast the Heroes Game between Iowa and Nebraska on Black Friday. We're planning extended on-site coverage, and we have no doubt it will provide an exciting conclusion to our seasons.

Additionally, we'll have the first prime time home opener in Michigan football history in week 1, to cap off our first football Saturday, which is a terrific way to begin the season.

Beyond that, today I wanted to share some news regarding our week 4 schedule. On Saturday, September 21st, BTN will have three non-conference games to go along with our first conference game. Times are yet to be announced, but we will have Boston College at Rutgers, Miami University at Ohio State, and UConn at Indiana to go along with a conference game to be selected at a later date.

All total, that gives us 17 games during the first four weeks and includes three non-conference match-ups against opponents from the SEC, the Big 12, and the ACC.

Additionally, we will be on-site at Rutgers' season opener with live coverage to kick off the 150th season of college football in what has become known as the literal birthplace of college football. During the first four weeks, we will also be broadcasting Coach Locksley's first game as the head coach at Maryland, Penn State's home opener in Happy Valley, and an in-state battle between Michigan State and Western Michigan.

Most importantly, over the course of the entire season, we'll have an opportunity to showcase each and every one of our schools and their campuses, and, in what is probably the best news of the day, we're extremely thankful to welcome Matt Millen back to the broadcast booth this fall. As most of you know, Matt had to step away last October as he dealt with amyloidosis and underwent a heart transplant in December. And in typical Matt fashion, his recovery has been ahead of schedule and he'll be ready to join his partner Kevin Kugler in the booth for week 1. He was able to join us for the Penn State spring game in April, and I can't tell you how thrilled our entire team was to see him back on his feet and talking football.

BTN Tailgate, our Saturday morning football show, will for the first time be live and on-site during all 14 weeks of the 2019 season. Given the scene on campus during any given Saturday in the Big Ten, we felt it was important to showcase those exciting environments at all of our schools. And, additionally, our BTN originals team will be producing a documentary on the Michigan-Michigan State rivalry. It's going to be called "Divided We Stand" and take a look at both the football and basketball programs. The air date is to be determined, but "Divided We Stand" will air on both BTN and FS1.

One significant change for this year -- and it's one we deemed worthy of making sure you all had your own cookie, so you know it's big -- and that's that our network content, football or otherwise, is going to be housed in the new FOX Sports app under the FOX Sports umbrella. As you know, BTN2Go had been our streaming platform, but that is now being transitioned to the FOX Sports app with the shift being complete by mid-August. The place to stream BTN content, football broadcasts, studio shows, original programming will be the FOX Sports app. You will not see any of that content on FOXSportsGo, which was sold off with the FOX Sports regional networks and also not on BTN2Go, which will cease to exist in its current form.

I think it's important to note that between BTN, FOX and FS1, we're talking about the broadcast rights for over 70 percent of Big Ten football inventory. So with so many games now in our family of networks, it no longer made sense to drive fans to separate locations.

As the media environment continues to change at a faster and faster rate, BTN will continue to lead on a variety of levels. We want to ensure we're staying ahead of the curve and delivering to our audiences wherever they may be. We focused our efforts on total consumption, meaning how much BTN content is being viewed across all platforms. As I'm sure you've all noticed as reporters and consumers, there are a multitude of options to consume content, whether it's watching BTN or streaming on the FOX Sports app or engaging in our social accounts on Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, and YouTube. We will have it all covered.

As you can imagine, after taking all of that into consideration, the metrics told a staggering story over the past year. We found that over 13 billion minutes of content were consumed via BTN platforms, 13 billion with a B. That was anchored by growth in network viewership on BTN of roughly 10 percent, which obviously was welcome news, and our social and streaming platforms also played a significant role.

So I know I'm tight on time. I want to, in closing, just say we are very excited for the season ahead, and on a personal note, I look forward to getting to know all of you in the months ahead.

FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports

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