Sports Media Digest- April 2, 2012

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Two Hour Town Hall on College Athletics on Next Costas Tonight- The next edition of the NBC Sports Network’s Costas Tonight will feature a live town hall meeting discussing the state of college athletics. Costas Tonight: Live from 30 Rock will take place in front of a live studio audience from iconic studio 8H at 30 Rockefeller Plaza, and will include an in-depth one-on-one interview with NCAA President Dr. Mark Emmert. Joined in a town hall setting by some of the top names in college sports, Costas will explore all of the headlines and critical issues facing college athletics, from academics to BCS realignment to Title IX. The two hour event debuts Wednesday at 10:00p.m. ET.

Women’s Final Four Shows Slight Ratings Gains- ESPN’s coverage of the NCAA Women’s Division I Final Four gave the network mixed ratings results. The opener between Connecticut and Notre Dame registered a rating of 1.8, up six percent from 2011. The nightcap between Baylor and Stanford gave ESPN a 2.2 rating, tied with game two from a year ago.

ESPN Has NBA Twin Bill Wednesday- ESPN is set to televise another NBA double header coming up this Wednesday night. The opener at 8:00p.m. ET will feature the Oklahoma City Thunder at the Miami Heat. Mike Breen, Hubie Brown and Lisa Salters will be on the call. In the nightcap, the Los Angeles Clippers will “host” the Los Angeles Lakers. The game will begin on ESPN at 10:30 p.m. ET with Mark Jones, Jeff Van Gundy and Heather Cox.

SiriusXM has Coverage of the Masters- SiriusXM Radio will be providing live coverage of this weekend’s Masters. The hole-by-hole programming begins Thursday, April 5th and continues through Sunday, April 8th. SiriusXM PGA TOUR Radio channel (XM channel 93, Sirius channel 208). John Maginnes will host a special preview show, The Masters Today, Thursday and Friday from 11:00 am to 2:00 pm ET and Saturday and Sunday from 12:00 to 2:00 pm ET. Immediately after the conclusion of each day’s play, SiriusXM’s Matt Adams will host Masters Review, giving listeners a full recap of the day’s action.

Tennis Channel to Encore its Top 100 Players of All Time Series- On Saturday, April 7th, the Tennis Channel will re-air the five part series ranking the top 100 tennis players of all-time. The two encore showings of 100 Greatest of all Time Presented by Ally Bank will run in its entirety from 11 a.m.-4 p.m. ET and again from 7 p.m.-midnight on Saturday.

Universal Sports Television Announces Distrbution Deals- Universal Sports Network has announced that it has reached a distribution deal with Bend Broadband and Wave Broadband. Those carriers have subscribers in west coast cities including San Francisco; Sacramento, Calif.; Rocklin, Calif.; Seattle; Portland, Ore.; and Bend, Ore. In addition, subscribers of Local Tel in Spokane, Wash. will also gain access to the network under a new agreement with the distributor. Universal Sports partners with NBC to provide Olympic-related sports programming in the United States.