FARMINGTON, Utah (March 8, 2025) – With Starch Madness primed to tip off in Boise, the Big Sky Conference and Scripps Sports have announced a five-year renewal, extending their relationship through at least the 2029-30 academic year.
Beginning with the 2022 football season, the partnership has featured more than 40 Big Sky contests produced and distributed by Scripps Sports as well as the Big Sky Hall of Fame Gala since its inception, the Big Sky Football Kickoff Show live from the conference’s annual media day, and the newest undertaking for the company, the Big Sky Courtside Show at the 2025 Big Sky Men’s and Women’s Basketball Championships, with live pre-game, halftime, and post-game coverage wrapped around each of the 18 total games in both tournaments starting Saturday at 11:30 a.m. MT.
“The Big Sky is grateful for what has been, and surely will continue to be, a wonderful partnership with Scripps Sports,” Big Sky Commissioner Tom Wistrcill said. “Over the last three years, each entity has grown, both collectively and individually, accentuating the brand of our league and member institutions -- and thus elevating the viewing experience. Scripps Sports’ wide reach across our territory and top-quality production makes our games more available and enjoyable than ever before for Big Sky fans, and we look forward to an even brighter and more visible future together.”
Scripps Sports currently airs Big Sky games on 18 Scripps-owned stations in all eight states of the league’s footprint, with six markets in Montana, three in Idaho, two in Arizona, two in California, two in Colorado, and one each in Oregon, Utah, and Washington.
“We’re thrilled to continue to bring Big Sky Sports to the loyal and passionate fans in this part of the country for the foreseeable future,” said Brian Lawlor, president, Scripps Sports.
Following ESPN’s selections, Scripps will have the right to broadcast annually at least 12 conference football games featuring Montana and Montana State, with each team playing at least one conference game per season in primetime. These broadcasts will include linear coverage in their opponents’ home market. Scripps will continue to have the exclusive linear rights to air the annual “Brawl of the Wild” between the Griz and Bobcats statewide in Montana.
Also included in the contract, Scripps will have the right to select, after ESPN, as many as eight women’s or men’s basketball games involving Montana or Montana State for broadcast, as well as the four “Brawl of the Wild” games between their men’s and women’s basketball squads. Additional conference football and men’s and women’s basketball games, as well as other sports, may be added by mutual agreement between the Big Sky Conference and Scripps.
The Big Sky Conference will retain rights to digitally distribute and stream programming via the ESPN+ app both within and outside the league’s footprint, and these broadcasts on Scripps will not be subject to any blackout restrictions.
The Big Sky’s extension with Scripps comes on the heels of a similar announcement in January with its
ESPN relationship through 2029-30.
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About the Big Sky Conference
Founded in 1963, the Big Sky Conference is a NCAA Division I conference competing in the Football Championship Subdivision. With nearly 150 teams representing 12 institutions in 15 sports (six men’s, nine women’s), the Big Sky prides itself on its “#ExperienceElevated” platform that emphasizes the unique traits and lifelong benefits that the conference and its member institutions provide to around 3,300 student-athletes each year.
The conference has 10 full members (Eastern Washington University; the University of Idaho; Idaho State University; the University of Montana; Montana State University; Northern Arizona University; the University of Northern Colorado; Portland State University; California State University, Sacramento; and Weber State University) located in eight states across the western United States, plus two football affiliate members (California Polytechnic State University and the University of California, Davis). Conference members have won 13 NCAA championships, including seven in football by five different members as well as six of the last nine Division I men’s cross country titles by NAU.
About Scripps Sports
Scripps Sports serves professional and college sports leagues, conferences and teams with local market depth and national broadcast reach. Scripps Sports currently has partnerships with the Women’s National Basketball Association (WNBA), the National Women’s Soccer League (NWSL), the National Hockey League’s (NHL) 2024 Stanley Cup champion Florida Panthers, the 2023 Stanley Cup champion Vegas Golden Knights, the new Utah Hockey Club and the NCAA’s Big Sky Conference. Scripps Sports is a division of The E.W. Scripps Company (NASDAQ: SSP), a Fortune 1000 American media company.