College Football on ABC
first began broadcasting regular season college football games in 1950, and has aired games of the now-National Collegiate Athletic Association Division I Football Bowl Subdivision annually since 1966. After the ABC Sports division was merged into ESPN Inc. by parent company Disney in 2006, broadcasts have since been produced by ESPN and have been billed as part of ESPN College Football.
Since the 2024 season, ABC has primarily broadcast Southeastern Conference games, billed as the SEC on ABC, succeeding the conference's long-time relationship with CBS. ABC also carries games from other conferences such as the American, Atlantic Coast, and Big 12, billed as ABC College Football. ABC typically broadcasts three Saturday games per-week, including afternoon games at 12:00 p.m and 3:30 p.m. ET, and Saturday Night Football in prime time. ABC also carries selected conference championships, bowl games, and College Football Playoff games.
History
1950s
By 1950, a small number of prominent football colleges, including the University of Pennsylvania and the University of Notre Dame had entered into individual contracts with networks to broadcast their games on a regional basis. In fact, all of Penn's home games were broadcast on ABC during the 1950 season under a contract that paid the university $150,000. However, prior to the 1951 season, the NCAA – alarmed by reports that indicated television broadcasts had decreased attendance at games – asserted control and prohibited live game broadcasts. Although the NCAA successfully forced Penn and Notre Dame to break their contracts, the NCAA suffered withering attacks for its 1951 policy, faced threats of antitrust hearings and eventually caved in and lifted blackouts of certain sold-out games. Bowl games were always outside the control of the NCAA, and the 1952 Rose Bowl at the end of that season was the first truly national telecast of a college football game, on NBC.For the 1952 season, the NCAA relented somewhat, but limited telecasts to one nationally broadcast game each week. The NCAA sold the exclusive rights to broadcast the weekly game to NBC for $1.144 million. ABC was able to circumvent these restrictions by producing a television series, Notre Dame Football, that featured a filmed version of the previous day's Notre Dame Fighting Irish football contest, with dead ball time and some inconsequential plays edited out for time, on Sunday evenings in fall 1953. Because the telecast was not live, it was legal under NCAA rules. ABC acquired the exclusive NCAA contract for 1954, losing it in 1955 to NBC.
The NCAA believed that broadcasting a single live game per week would prevent further controversy while limiting any decrease in attendance. However, the Big Ten Conference was unhappy with the arrangement, and it pressured the NCAA to allow regional telecasts as well. Finally in 1955, the NCAA revised its plan, keeping eight national games while permitting regional telecasts on five specified weeks during the season. ABC won the contract under this arrangement for 1960 and 1961.
1960s
ABC won the NCAA contract from the 1966 season onwards. This was essentially the television plan that stayed in place until the University of Oklahoma and the University of Georgia filed a lawsuit against the NCAA in 1981, alleging antitrust violations. The lawsuit, NCAA v. Board of Regents of the University of Oklahoma, made it all the way to the Supreme Court, who in 1984 ruled in favor of Oklahoma and Georgia and declared the NCAA's forced collective contract a violation of antitrust law. ABC then negotiated with the College Football Association for its game package.ABC announced the entire 1966 TV schedule in June with 8 national games and 24 regional games for a total of 15 broadcast windows. In 1966, the NCAA allowed each school to appear on ABC for at most one national telecast and one regional telecast. On November 19, 1966, ABC showed a regional doubleheader. The main early game was Notre Dame-Michigan State. This was the famous 10–10 tie. ABC was unable to televise this game live nationally due to the above restriction. However, ABC got approval from the NCAA to show this game on tape delay in the late timeslot in the regions of the country which got Kentucky-Tennessee in the early timeslot.
On September 23, 1967, Chris Schenkel and Bud Wilkinson were scheduled to announce the Penn State-Navy game. However, there was an NABET strike of engineers and technicians which AFTRA was supporting and this duo refused to work the game. So ABC Sports producer Chuck Howard did play-by-play on this game. Howard lined up Jim Tarman and Bud Thalman to provide color commentary.
On October 12 and October 19, 1968, Keith Jackson worked with Bud Wilkinson on the primary game because Chris Schenkel was in Mexico City working the Olympics. The November 16 Alabama-Miami game was the first ever prime time regular season college football national telecast.
1970s
The September 2, 1973 edition of the Abeliene Reporter-News stated that ABC would be broadcasting 37 games that season. Chris Schenkel, Keith Jackson, Bill Flemming, Lynn Sanner, and Bob Murphy were named as the play-by-play men with Bud Wilkinson, Duffy Daugherty, Lee Grosscup, Forest Evashevski, and Monty Stickles as color commentators. College Football Today both preceded and followed the games. At halftime, was first half highlights and Coaches Corner with a different coach being interviewed weekly.In 1974, ABC elevated Jackson to #1 announcer replacing Chris Schenkel, who moved to anchor the studio show. Also that year, ABC used many active coaches as guest analysts. John McKay was originally scheduled to work the season opener on September 7, but Bob Devaney called the game with Jackson. Meanwhile, ABC added Jim Lampley and Don Tollefson for sideline interviews and features on the telecasts. This duo made its debut on the September 7 game. The September 9, 1974 game was the first ever NCAA college football Monday night telecast. For the Monday night telecast, Jackson paired with the then-Texas head coach Darrell Royal to broadcast the game.
In 1975, ABC carried two Monday night games. The first Monday night game was Missouri vs. Alabama on September 8, and Notre Dame vs. Boston College on September 15. ABC continued to use active coaches as guest commentators on some games this year.
In 1976, ABC added ex-Notre Dame coach Ara Parseghian as its #1 analyst. ABC opened the season with a Thursday night telecast.
By 1977, Keith Jackson, Chris Schenkel, Verne Lundquist, Jim Lampley, and Bill Flemming were ABC's primary play-by-play announcers. Schenkel called the October 15 game as Jackson was calling Game 4 of the World Series later that afternoon. Ex-Arkansas coach and Frank Broyles was in his first year with ABC as an analyst. Meanwhile, Ara Parseghian and Lee Grosscup were ABC's primary analysts along with Broyles. In other words, Grosscup essentially alternated with Broyles and Parseghian as the #1 analyst. ABC had a policy which prevented Broyles from calling any Arkansas games since he was still employed by Arkansas.
ABC opened the 1978 season with a prime time game on the Saturday of Labor Day weekend and also carried a prime time game on Friday, December 1. On October 7, after calling the Oklahoma-Texas game in Dallas, Keith Jackson headed to New York and called Game 4 of the American League Championship Series that night. On December 2, ABC showed both Division II semifinals and the Division III Championship regionally with Georgia Tech @ Georgia. And on December 9, ABC showed the Division 1AA semifinals regionally with the Division II final.
ABC did not carry any prime time games in 1979. On October 13, ABC joined the football game in progress after Game 4 of the World Series. Meanwhile, ESPN televised selected non-ABC games on tape delay. ABC had exclusive rights to live telecasts.
1980s
ABC opened the 1980 season with a prime time game on Labor Day. On October 11, after calling the Oklahoma-Texas game in Dallas, Keith Jackson headed to Houston and joined the telecast of Game 4 of the National League Championship Series in the middle innings.By 1981, ABC used Frank Broyles as the #1 analyst after a few years of essentially alternating with Ara Parseghian in that year. The next year, Ara worked for CBS. 1 of the games he didn't participate with Keith Jackson in the broadcast booth is the then-#1 Texas Longhorns being defeated by his Arkansas Razorbacks 42-11, which at the time he was still the athletic director for Arkansas, which goes against ABC Sports's policy. Also on that year, Chris Schenkel was removed from the College Football broadcasts altogether.
Per the September 1, 1982 edition of the Elyria Chronicle Telegram and the September 1, 1982 edition of Sports Illustrated, ABC and CBS officials met with NCAA representatives and flipped a coin to determine "control dates". This allowed the network with priority on a particular date to have first choice when selecting the game it wished to air and whether it wanted the 12:00 ET or 3:30 ET timeslot. CBS won the first toss and thus earned first choice on seven dates: September 18, September 25, October 2, October 9, October 16, November 6, and November 20. ABC then got first pick on six dates, September 11, October 23, October 30, November 13, November 27, and December 4. ABC and CBS also had the right to take away a game from WTBS as long as it did so no later than the Monday before the game. WTBS was only able to show teams that had not been on national TV in 1981 and a maximum of four teams that had been on regional TV on two occasions. Beginning in 1982, Jim Lampley hosted College Football Today alongside and Beano Cook. Jack Whitaker was also on the ABC pregame/halftime show.
On October 9, 1982, Game 4 of the ALCS ran so long after a lengthy rain delay that ABC was unable to join the football games until late in the 4th quarter. ABC did not air any college football game on October 16. CBS meanwhile, had the late window and NBC carried Game 4 of the World Series at 1 p.m. Lee Grosscup worked with Keith Jackson on two late season Arkansas games because of ABC's aforementioned policy that prevented Broyles from calling Razorback games. Instead, he was assigned as an analyst for the USC-UCLA contest and worked alongside Al Michaels. He would work again with Michaels the next year for the Gator Bowl contest between Iowa and Florida, while substituting for Grosscup, who was out with an illness.
On October 8, 1983, ABC aired some Division III games to small portions of the country to satisfy its TV contract requirements on DIII games. On October 15, ABC aired Game 4 of the World Series at 1 prior to Nebraska-Missouri while CBS went head-to-head with the World Series in most of the country.
As previously mentioned, in June 1984, a US Supreme Court ruling ended the control that the NCAA had exercised on televised college football and allowed individual colleges to make their own TV deals. CBS obtained rights to ACC, Big 10 and Pac 10 home games while ABC obtained rights to the College Football Association. CBS also separately obtained rights to Miami Hurricanes home games, including the Boston College-Miami contest and the Army–Navy Game. CBS and ABC typically carried only 1-2 games per time slot rather than the frequent large slates of regional games in prior years. Meanwhile, ESPN carried live CFA games each Saturday typically at noon and 7:30 p.m. WTBS carried SEC games. USA Network also carried games. ABC did not carry any games on September 22 while CBS did not carry any on October 6.
ABC used Al Trautwig on play-by-play on October 19, 1985 and Tim Brant on October 26 as Al Michaels was calling the World Series. On December 7, Keith Jackson and Frank Broyles called the first half of SMU @ Oklahoma. Jackson became sick at halftime, so Brant and Broyles called the second half.
On October 11, 1986, Keith Jackson called Game 3 of the NLCS. Instead, Corey McPherrin and Tim Brant did play-by-play alongside Lynn Swann and Mike Adamle respectively for ABC that day.
In 1987, ABC took over Big 10/Pac 10 rights while CBS got rights to the CFA, while retaining the rights to broadcast ACC and Miami Hurricanes home games. On August 30, ABC carried the Kickoff Classic on a Sunday afternoon. Neither ABC nor CBS carried college football during the late afternoon on October 24 as ABC televised Game 6 of the World Series at 4 p.m. ET. The game ABC aired before the World Series was a 38–14 victory for the Iowa Hawkeyes over the Purdue Boilermakers.
In 1988, ABC used Chris Schenkel on two games in October alongside Dick Vermeil. On October 8, Gary Bender was on ALCS TV duty and thus Schnekel filled in for him.