Why does the NCAA championship start at 9:19 p.m. ET (and on cable)?
History will be made Monday night and it won't have anything to do with Roy Williams passing Dean Smith, Villanova adding another banner to their "Perfect Game" title from 1985 or Charles Barkley actually pronouncing the name Ryan Arcidiacono correctly.
For the first time in history, the NCAA title game will leave network television for cable and its audience of 22 million fewer viewers. (CBS is available in about 116 million homes. TBS beams to 94 million.) And, not only that, the game will tip at 9:19 p.m. ET, a full nine minutes later than the 2014 title game and a full snooze cycle's worth of time, which might not seem like a big deal in the moment but will the next morning when you're lethargically smacking your hand around your bedside table trying to find your alarm clock to give you that blissful extra nine minutes of slumber before the sobering reality of morning slaps you in the face like Grayson Allen.
(Steven Branscombe-USA TODAY Sports)
1. Why is the game on cable?
Why does anything happen? Why does sun rise in the East and set in the West? Why does man dream of going to the moon? Why do we fight wars, both literal and metaphorical? What's the engine that makes the world go? Money. Dough. Loot. Bread. Greenbacks. Moola. Shekels. Coin. Anytime you have a question about why something is happening in sports, the answer is "money" especially if the question is "why would the Cowboys sign Johnny Manziel?"
The shortest possible version of the story: When the rights for the tournament were up back in 2010 there was much discussion about going to a 96- or 128-team tournament (which thankfully failed) or ESPN placing the winning bid (which would have sent the full tournament to cable, unless there was ever an ABC simulcast). For CBS to keep the tournament it'd aired since 1982, the network partnered with Turner (of CNN, TBS and TNT fame and truTV oblivion) to get the high bid. To do so, the Tiffany network had to make concessions, one of which was, starting this year, CBS and TBS would alternate airing the national championship.
Is it a big deal? For people under the age of 25, the concept of "network television" is as foreign as Snapchat and Spotify are to their parents. They don't care where the game is; they'll find it or stream it or be too busy telling their friends they've unbundled as they wait for Bernie Sanders to come out and speak. The title game on cable is business. It's a big deal only for people who have reasons to care about these things (owners of CBS affiliates), those with a rose-colored view of the past who fear change (like myself) and/or people who don't know their channel lineup (the over/under on my mom texting tonight "What channel game on?" is 9:07 p.m. ET, to be followed by "why so late?")
2. Yes, why so late indeed?
Nine-ninteen? That's a flight number, not the starting time of a sporting event. That's what you set your alarm for on a Saturday morning when you don't want to be a total waste of space. It's what you call out when you're serving against someone who's a lot better at ping pong than you. That's when TBS should be showing reruns of The Big Bang Theory, causing you to wonder aloud, to nobody in particular, who's watching this show? It is not, and should not, NCAA, be the start time of a sporting event involving two East-coast teams.
Actually though, 9:19 p.m. ET is early for a recent title tip. There have been stretches of years in the past decade when the game tipped at 9:23 p.m. ET. And then, without warning, it's fluctuated between times in the 9:10 to 9:21 corridor. (Why does it happen? Remember the credo from above? $$$$$$$. If it could be proved that networks would make more money airing NFL games at 2:28 a.m. ET, they would.)
Are Cats nocturnal? (Photo by Ronald Martinez/Getty Images)
What is TBS going to do for the 19 minutes after the clock strikes nine? If the answer is any more than "four minutes of Kenny Smith reminding viewers he went to UNC while Charles Barkley counts his money from the Pina Colada commercial," then it's three minutes too long. I mean, 19 minutes if a lot of time to fill. You could almost fit a commercial-free episode of TBBT into that slot.
Even the NFL kicks off earlier, you'll say! If the king doesn't wait until 9 p.m. why should little ol' college basketball? This argument ignores the fact that NFL games take more than three hours while, depending on how whistle happy our officiating crew is tonight, a college basketball game should take around two. Put 'em together and Sunday Night Football is still finishing after the title game.
(Photo by Lance King/Getty Images)
But you don't have to wait around until 9:19 p.m. ET for primetime football to start. Getting to 8:30 p.m. ET is the goal and then you balance that high-wire act of debating whether to keep watching or not start your work week in a comatose state. But when you have 49 more minutes to kill time before an event begins, the answer becomes easier and easier, the bed looks more and more comfortable and those beers you kicked at happy hour are asking whether it's really worth risking it all to stay up and watch something like that UConn-Butler game from 2011.
It is. After all, Luther's singing One Shining Moment. Probably close to midnight, but still.
