ESPN Announce Atlantic Sun Conference Media Rights Extension

Disney has announced that ESPN has signed a one-year extension with the Atlantic Sun Conference (ASUN) to their media rights agreement. ESPN will continue as the ASUN’s media partner through the 2025-26 academic year with expanded linear network coverage that now includes the Women’s Basketball Championship Final airing on ESPNU in March.

ASUN Commissioner Jeff Bacon said in a statement regarding the new deal:

“Thank you to our tremendous teammates at ESPN for their continued commitment to Atlantic Sun Conference student-athletes, and for their interest in ensuring that ASUN Women’s Basketball is presented to a national audience as it deserves. I look forward to the coming year and am grateful to Nick Dawson, Mallory Kenny and the entire team at ESPN as we head towards a new era under our Alliance with the Western Athletic Conference.”

The ASUN’s relationship with ESPN first began in 1989 with the airing of the league’s Men’s Basketball Final and grew exponentially through the conference’s ESPN3 On-Campus Initiative, which began in the fall of 2012. In April of 2018, the ASUN and ESPN announced 55 events to be streamed via ESPN’s then-new direct-to-consumer platform, ESPN+. That spring, six ASUN Championships were showcased on ESPN+, including the entirety of the Baseball, Beach Volleyball, Lacrosse, Softball and Tennis Championships. Since its inception, ESPN has collaborated with the ASUN to adopt the conference-wide on-campus production model.

In the 2024–25 academic year, ASUN and its 12 members produced 1,184 ESPN broadcasts. This number encompassed 14 conference championships, including the Men’s Basketball Championship Final between Lipscomb and North Alabama, which aired on ESPN2 and saw nearly 30,000 unique viewers watch the Bisons hoist the tournament trophy. The 2024-25 production total marked the third year in a row that the league has pushed out more than 1,000 broadcasts, with 1,296 in 2023-24 and 1,155 in 2022-23.

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