Comcast/Charter Sports Southeast
| Comcast Sports Southeast Charter Sports Southeast |
|
|---|---|
 |
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| Launched | 1999 |
| Owned by | Comcast and Charter Communications (Cable Sports Southeast, LLC) |
| Slogan | The Face of College Sports in the South |
| Country | United States |
| Broadcast area | Alabama Arkansas Florida Georgia Kentucky Louisiana Mississippi North Carolina South Carolina Tennessee Texas Virginia West Virginia |
| Sister channel(s) | Comcast SportsNet NBC Sports |
| Website | CSS Sports |
Comcast Sports Southeast and Charter Sports Southeast (CSS) is a regional sports network for the Southern United States operated as a joint venture between the cable television companies Comcast and Charter Communications. In contrast to its competitor Fox Sports South, CSS has a heavier focus on college sports—with broadcasting partnerships with many of the area's colleges and universities.
The network is carried exclusively on cable television systems in the region, primarily those owned by Comcast and Charter. The initials stand for Comcast Sports Southeast in Comcast markets and Charter Sports Southeast in Charter markets. However, the logo closely resembles that of Comcast, and it is branded as part of the NBC Sports Group along with the Comcast SportsNet networks. The channel reaches over 6 million homes in the Southern U.S.
Programming [edit]
CSS is in direct competition with Fox Sports South and SportSouth. All three networks share some programming, including college coaches' shows. CSS, by and large, has closer relationships with many of the region's individual colleges and universities, whereas Fox Sports South and SportSouth have ties to most of the South's professional sports teams and the Southeastern and Atlantic Coast conferences as wholes. CSS, on the other hand, will regularly broadcast live sporting events of some of the smaller and less heralded colleges of the region, as well as those of some of the large SEC and ACC schools (for example, college baseball coverage includes SEC, ACC, Sun Belt, C-USA, and Atlantic Sun conference games[1]). During football season, CSS produces its own feeds of many of the region's major college games exclusively for tape-delayed broadcasts, even though the games may have aired live on other networks.
Local cable systems are able to pre-empt normal CSS programming in favor of local sporting events, such as high school football and basketball games and local collegiate sporting events.
CSS is home to a nightly sports talk show known as SportsNite. On most Comcast SportsNet systems, this program is in a newscast format similar to SportsCenter, but on CSS, it more closely resembles a southern-exclusive version of FSN's The Best Damn Sports Show Period.
CSS also broadcasts the WNBA's Atlanta Dream, the Arena Football League's Georgia Force, Orlando Predators and Tampa Bay Storm, Major League Lacrosse, Southern League and South Atlantic League Minor League baseball, and previously broadcasted some CFL contests.
In March 2008, CSS's owners Comcast and Charter struck separate deals with the Atlanta Braves to simulcast 45 regular season and 2 exhibition games produced and broadcast in the Atlanta metropolitan area by WPCH-TV. The broadcasts were available on CSS on Charter and Comcast cable systems throughout Alabama, Mississippi, Tennessee, South Carolina, Georgia (except for Metro Atlanta), and the city of Asheville, North Carolina.[2][3] This deal ended in the 2011 season—due to the operations of WPCH being taken over by Meredith Corporation, production duties for the Braves telecasts were transferred to Fox Sports South, and were instead simulcast on SportsSouth outside of Atlanta;[4] On March 1, 2013, Fox Sports South and SportSouth announced they have picked up 45 more Atlanta Braves games, ending the team's contract with WPCH-TV.[5]
Beginning in April 2009, CSS will broadcast at least 25 Gwinnett Braves games for the next four seasons.[6]
References [edit]
- ^ http://www.css-sports.com/pages/college_baseball
- ^ montgomeryadvertiser.com | Montgomery Advertiser
- ^ Deal allows more Braves games to air locally | CITIZEN-TIMES.com | Asheville Citizen-Times
- ^ Swartz, Kristi E. (January 18, 2011). "Parent of CBS Atlanta to take over operations of Peachtree TV". Atlanta Journal-Constitution. Retrieved January 18, 2011.
- ^ Fox Picks Up Braves' Games from PeachTree TV Multichannel News, March 1, 2013
- ^ http://web.minorleaguebaseball.com/news/article.jsp?ymd=20090327&content_id=542364&vkey=pr_t431&fext=.jsp&sid=t431
