ESPN announced its first wave of college football broadcasts for the '17 season, and the net is "offering a reminder that it very much has a presence with marquee games" from the Big Ten after splitting the conference's rights deal with Fox, according to Angelique Chengelis of the DETROIT NEWS. The Thursday night Indiana-Ohio State game on Aug. 31 will serve as ESPN's first broadcast of the season, while Utah State-Wisconsin will air the next night and Akron-Penn State will be the net's first Saturday afternoon broadcast. ESPN will then air Michigan-Florida from AT&T Stadium at 3:30pm ET on Sept. 2. With four of the Big Ten's top teams featured on ABC/ESPN during the first week, ESPN execs are "hoping to remind fans that the conference rights are shared" between the two media giants. ESPN VP/College Sports Programming Nick Dawson: "We are going to come out of the Big Ten gate strong. ... It's important to us to remind viewers the Big Ten still lives on ESPN, as well." Chengelis noted Fox is getting "first dibs on the Big Ten's biggest matchups and selected the Michigan-Ohio State game this fall" (DETROITNEWS.com, 5/25). In Columbus, Bill Rabinowitz noted ABC in primetime on Sept. 9 will air the "marquee non-conference rematch" between Ohio State and Oklahoma. Dawson: "Oklahoma at Ohio State is one of the premier games of the entire college football season, let alone on the Big Ten schedule" (DISPATCH.com, 5/25).
