Tuesday, December 15, 2015

PORTLAND, Ore. – Great Northwest Athletic Conference men’s and women’s basketball returns to ROOT SPORTS during the 2015-16 season, with a five-game telecast schedule set to open up Jan. 9 in a contest featuring defending regular season men’s conference champion Western Oregon playing host to Saint Martin’s University.

In addition to the ROOT SPORTS schedule, the championship doubleheader of the GNAC’s postseason tournament on Sat., Mar. 5, will be carried live throughout the country as part of the Division II Basketball National Showcase on the American Sports Network. The men’s game tips off at 5:30 p.m. PST and will be followed by the women’s title game at 7:30 p.m. PST.

In all, the GNAC will be featured either regionally or nationally three times in January, twice in February and twice in March. The 2015-16 campaign marks the seventh consecutive season in which the GNAC will have a presence on ROOT SPORTS, the premier regional sports network in the Pacific Northwest, and the third consecutive year in which the conference has featured a “Game of the Week” series on the network.

ROOT SPORTS is carried in more than 3.4 million homes in the states of Washington, Oregon, Idaho, Montana and Alaska – all states in which the GNAC has member institutions.

For channel listings on all television service providers, visit www.rootsports.com/northwest and click on ‘Channel Finder’.

“The GNAC is extremely pleased to continue our Game of the Week series on ROOT SPORTS,” said conference commissioner Dave Haglund. “This has been a successful and long-standing association and helps expose our great brand of basketball to fans in our conference footprint and beyond. And we are looking forward to featuring our conference tournament championship games on the DII basketball showcase and reaching an even wider audience for the GNAC.”

ABOUT ROOT SPORTS
ROOT SPORTS is the home of the Seattle Mariners, Seattle Seahawks, Seattle Sounders FC, Portland Timbers, Gonzaga Bulldogs, Big Sky Conference and Mountain West Conference. The network reaches 3.4 million households across five states, including Washington, Oregon, Idaho, Montana and Alaska, and delivers more than 350 live events each year – all of which are available in high definition.

ROOT SPORTS is operated by DIRECTV Sports Networks LLC, which is now part of the AT&T family. It operates regional sports networks in the Northwest, Pittsburgh, Rocky Mountain and Southwest regions. The four networks combined reach 13 million households across 22 states and own exclusive programming and distribution partnerships with more than 25 teams and conferences. DIRECTV Sports Networks is a subsidiary of DIRECTV, the world’s most popular television service.

ABOUT AMERICAN SPORTS NETWORK
ASN is composed of 162 Sinclair-owned and operated television stations nationwide with 376 channels in 79 markets, which combine to reach approximately 43 million households nationwide. ASN has also developed an affiliate network of regional sports networks to increase the per-game potential distribution to more than 60 million households on average. The company, which launched in 2014-15, produced 250 college events in nine sports and plans to air more than 375 events in 2015-16.

ABOUT SINCLAIR BROADCAST GROUP, INC.
Sinclair Broadcast Group, Inc. is the largest and one of the most diversified television broadcasting companies in the country with 162 television stations, airing 376 channels in 79 markets, and with affiliations with all the major networks.  The company regularly uses its website as a key source of company information which can be accessed at www.sbgi.net.