The Detroit Titans will enjoy perhaps their most comprehensive men's basketball television coverage ever during the 2009-10 season as no less than nine games will be broadcast on one of four different networks.
UDM will expand its partnership with FOX Sports Detroit to include a minimum of four live broadcasts on the region-wide network. That schedule includes home games against three big Horizon League rivals – Cleveland State, Wright State and nationally-ranked Butler – as well as a road contest at Butler on Feb. 4. The Titans enjoyed outstanding ratings on FOX Sports Detroit a year ago in a three-game broadcast package.
Detroit will be featured on the Big Ten Network once again when the Titans travel to Michigan to face the nationally-rated Wolverines for the first time since the 1999-2000 season.
ESPNU will telecast two Detroit games this winter – the season-opener at Top 25 member California as well as a conference match-up in Calihan Hall with Valparaiso, which is part of the Horizon League's Friday Night Game of the Week package. ESPNU has greatly increased its household reach within the last year, including most of Comcast's affiliates in the metro Detroit area.
The Horizon League has partnered with WebStream Productions to produce a Saturday afternoon Game of the Week package for 2009-10. Detroit will be featured twice on that slate, playing in televised road games at Valparaiso and Youngstown State.
The Titans are also in the pool of potential candidates to be televised as part of BracketBuster Saturday on one of the ESPN family of networks, and the Horizon League Championship Game will be televised by ESPN as well.
Additionally, all home games as well as road games within the Horizon League schedule – a total of 24 contests – will be web streamed live via the internet on the Horizon League Network. All of the HLN webcasts from Calihan Hall will be even further enhanced this year with the addition of live halftime interviews, player profiles and other new features.
“We are very proud of our expanded television coverage with FOX Sports Detroit,” UDM athletic director Keri Gaither said. “To be able to increase the number of games on FOX Sports Detroit this year as well as to partner with FS Detroit on some new community initiatives, it shows their strong commitment to the Detroit Titans and the basketball program coach (Ray) McCallum is building.”
Gaither also announced that coach McCallum's popular “Two-Minute Drill” segment will continue on Wednesdays throughout the season on WDFN-AM 1130, but there will be no radio broadcasts of Titan games this season.
“We have put more emphasis on our increased schedule of telecasts this year and virtually every one of our games will be available for viewing either on TV or on the HLN. We feel this is what our fans want the most,” Gaither noted. “We've had very positive feedback about our webcasts and we think our fans will enjoy them even more this year with the enhancements that are planned.”
Under second-year head coach McCallum and armed with seven veterans from last season plus a wave of talented newcomers, the Titans will play pre-season games against Ohio Dominican (Friday) and Adrian (Nov. 6) before opening the regular-season with the televised game at California on Nov. 11. They will play their official home opener four days later when old rival Western Michigan comes to Calihan Hall. The Titans went undefeated (5-0) during a successful August exhibition trip to Spain.
-Detroit Titans-
