Cable customers will be spared pay-per-view charges when the University of Hawaii opens its football season at Massachusetts in two weeks.
Both Spectrum (formerly Oceanic Time Warner here) and Hawaiian Telcom said they will offer the Aug. 26 game free of additional charges to their subscribers via cable box on Spectrum channels 257/1257 HD and Hawaiian Telcom channels 91/1091 HD.
The announcement came Friday, the result of a deal involving the Eleven Sports Network, UMass, UH, Spectrum and the Mountain West Conference. A UMass spokesman said it “involved a contract grant of rights with both the home and visiting teams.”
“(A) great collaborative effort. Excited our fans will get to watch the Rainbow Warriors in our opener,” UH athletic director David Matlin said via text message.
Spectrum and Hawaiian Telcom will each offer six other UH games on a pay-per-view basis, beginning with the Sept. 2 home opener against Western Carolina. Spectrum will begin taking PPV orders Aug. 11 and Hawaiian Telcom on Aug. 21.
Matlin and a Spectrum spokesperson declined to say if picking up the UMass game allows UH to meet its contractual obligation to deliver a minimum of seven games to its TV partner. Under terms of the contract, Spectrum would qualify for a partial rebate on the $2.3 million it guarantees the school in rights fees if the threshold isn’t met or if Spectrum has to negotiate a deal with a third-party provider.
The process was complicated by UMass, which owns the rights to the game, being an independent. The Minutemen didn’t announce their 2017 TV partnership with Eleven Sports until Friday. Last year UMass had deals with the New England Sports Network and the American Sports Network, the latter ceasing operations earlier this year.
Eleven Sports is a United Kingdom-based network that began operations in the U.S. in March, replacing One World Sports. Mostly known for soccer, it also holds some rights to Big Sky Conference and Ivy League football.
The broadcast team for the game will be from Eleven Sports.
UMass said the game will be streamed free of charge on its athletic website.
Meanwhile, Spectrum also announced a resumption of live streaming of UH football outside of Hawaii for this season via the Mountain West Conference app, available on phones and tablets.
Last year streaming was not available while Oceanic sought ways to prevent non-subscribers in the state from circumventing so-called geo-blocking or geo-fencing. At issue, people involved have said, were growing concerns over protecting the rights of Oceanic, which pays UH for exclusivity in the market.
The blackout kept prospective recruits and families of players and far-flung UH fans from following the games.
In another change this season, Spectrum said it will move 19 Rainbow Wahine volleyball matches from Spectrum Sports to OC 16 to provide wider access for its subscribers.