ESPN will add 12 WNBA regular-season telecasts, plus
playoff contests, to its season schedule this year, bringing
its total number of games to approximately 35 on ESPN and
ESPN2. The games, which were part of Lifetime's Friday TV
schedule, will now air on ESPN2 Thursday nights and Sunday
afternoons (ESPN). DAILY VARIETY's Paula Bernstein writes
that although Lifetime has two years remaining on its six-
year deal with the WNBA, "both orgs decided the games would
fare better on an all-sports net than the women's cabler."
But NBAE will produce a new weekly, half-hour WNBA-themed
magazine show that will begin airing on Lifetime Friday
nights in May (DAILY VARIETY, 12/18).
THE VIEW: In CA, Marcia Smith wrote that women are
"watching sports like never before" and have "quietly
revolutionized mainstream sports viewership." According to
'99-00 figures, women have "surged" from being 25% of the
network TV audience for regular season NFL, NBA, NHL and MLB
games in '90, to more than 33% in '00. Meanwhile, women
compose 35-45% of the TV viewing audience for women's sports
events. The gender breakdown "across all programming" on
ESPN is 73% male, 27% female (O.C. REGISTER, 12/17).
