By Bruce Campbell Commentary

Dart to the Universities of Oklahoma and Tulsa for agreeing to move their football game from a Saturday (Sept. 22) to a Friday (Sept. 21) to accommodate an ESPN2 telecast.

The real dart belongs to ESPN2.

One could possibly understand Tulsa — which gets little national TV attention — for agreeing to move a home game to a Friday night to get on ESPN2.

OU, at least, consulted the Oklahoma Secondary Schools Activities Association before agreeing to it.

Friday nights should be exclusively for high schools. ESPN could certainly fill its programming with major league baseball for that night, especially in September with the pennant races heating up.

A televised OU-Tulsa game could have a severe impact on high school football gates across the state.

Now, the died-in-the-wool fans (i.e. parents, girl friends, etc.) will come, but there are a lot of people who are OU fans first and high school second.

What if it takes 100 people out of going to an Enid High game, for instance?

Assuming those would be adult tickets, it could cost EHS $600.

That’s small potatoes for a big-time college program, but it’s always big for high schools, who don’t have a sugar daddy like a T. Boone Pickens.

That would be the travel budget for a non-revenue sport or the full budget for a non-revenue sport, depending on the school.

Heck, if even it takes 10 to 15 fans away from a small school, the loss of $50 to $60 could be felt.

It’s also puts a crimp on local radio stations.

KGWA Radio does the OU and Enid High games. One could be put on sister station KOFM, but that would knock out a high school game of the week.

Chisholm Trail Broadcasting faces the same dilemma when Oklahoma State travels to Troy for a Friday night game Sept. 14. KNID, OSU’s radio home in Enid, usually does a high school game of the week.

Now, ESPN could put games on Sunday night, Tuesday night, Wednesday night or Thursday night. Heck, teams in Tulsa’s position would play after midnight to get on ESPN.

Heck, ESPN could put on a high school game instead of trying to hurt gates by televising college games. High schools are the pipelines to colleges the same way colleges are to the pros.

You don’t see ESPN try to put on a Saturday afternoon NFL game on. That would hurt the college ratings.

It’s just sad OU and TU fans are going to have to choose between the Sooners and Golden Hurricane or their favorite high school team.

Thank goodness for VCRs which might help fans do both.



Campbell is a News & Eagle sports writer.