NBC announced this morning that it will present 172
hours of original Olympic coverage as part of its 273 hours
of Olympic programming on cable channels CNBC and MSNBC
during its 18 days of coverage of the 2000 Olympic Games.
The cable coverage marks the first time the Summer Olympics
will be presented on basic cable. All coverage will be tape
delayed due to the 15-hour time difference between Sydney
and N.Y. NBC has named Jim Lampley and Pat O'Brien as
studio hosts for MSNBC's and CNBC's coverage, respectively.
The two cable channels will carry over 30 Olympic finals,
including men's and women's soccer, boxing, men's and
women's tennis, equestrian, men's and women's water polo,
baseball, archery, sailing, track cycling and weightlifting.
MSNBC will provide coverage from 10:00am-5:00pm ET on
weekdays and will also have weekend programming, while CNBC
will provide coverage from 5:00-9:00pm ET on weeknights and
4:00-9:00pm weekends. MSNBC will also show replay coverage
from 12:00am-7:00am on weekdays and 12:00am-6:00am on
weekends. NBC says if the U.S. men's soccer team qualifies
for the Games, "its games will be a large part of the cable
programming" (NBC). NBC Olympics co-Chair Dennis Swanson
told THE DAILY this morning that MSNBC will offer extensive
coverage of women's soccer, softball and boxing, in
particular. Swanson: "We will show every match of the U.S.
women's soccer team from start to finish. That hasn't
happened in the past. ... Boxing will really benefit from
the cable coverage, as we will provide two hours of boxing
every night. ... The idea behind this was to really give
these sports the attention they deserve." Swanson, on the
various NBC offerings: "You have to be able to compete in a
multichannel environment these days. The Games are a huge
attraction to NBC in any venue and we will do a great deal
of cross promotion of our extensive coverage" (THE DAILY).
