After giving K-State first-class treatment in their daylong coverage of the Sunflower Showdown on Jan. 30 as part of the College Gameday telecast, the network decided to overlook round two of the rivalry.
The game, which placed a record crowd in the Octagon of Doom for the Gameday festivities and followed it up with a marquee overtime thriller in January, has been slotted for a place on the lowly Big 12 Network tonight.
Mistake? Absolutely.
Unless of course you would prefer to enjoy the national coverage lineup ESPN has decided to serve up in place of the only Top-5 match up of the evening. In place of the feisty rivalry game which took overtime to decide in January will be a primetime contest between Connecticut and Notre Dame—both unranked.
Over on ESPN2 there will be a slightly more tolerable match up between Texas A&M and Oklahoma State. National coverage worthy? Sure.
Yet the griping across the nation has been heard loudly already. An ESPN SportsNation poll released today, asked the question “Which game interests you the most?” and shows that two-thirds of the nation left in the dark for tonight’s Sunflower Showdown see the match up as the game of the night. Only the states of South Carolina, North Carolina, Maryland, Massachusetts and Connecticut disagree.
The poll currently has over 51,000 respondents.
It’s clear the college basketball fans outside of the Midwest will be left in the dark Wednesday night and will miss out on the clear-cut game of the night.
Maybe ESPN will learn their lesson and take a closer look at the Sunflower Showdown next season.
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