Tourney challenge is awaiting MPBN New Class A schedule adds wrinkles

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After becoming synonymous with Eastern Maine Classes B, C and D tournament basketball coverage for 24 years, Maine Public Broadcasting Network jumped in with the big boys and added Class A tourney coverage to its already ambitious endeavor in 2003.

Four years later, the landscape has once again changed for MPBN as all four tournaments will run simultaneously, causing some drastic changes in the public network’s broadcast game plan and schedule.

“For the last three years, we’ve been doing 56 games in 11 days over a three-week period,” said Lou Morin, MPBN marketing and communications manager. “The decision to condense the schedule really affected our approach this year.”

MPBN will still broadcast the Eastern and Western Maine Classes C and D semifinals, regional finals and state championships; the Eastern Classes A and B semifinals and regional finals; and the Class B state championship, all from Augusta and Bangor.

That left Western Maine Classes A and B with the short straw along with the Class A state finals.

“The big elephant in the room is the fact the Class A state championship games wouldn’t be on and those are the biggest schools in the state,” Morin said.

After three months of discussions, relief came in the form of cable companies Time Warner and Adelphia, which reached agreement with MPBN a month ago to air the Class A state championship games on their local cable access channels (Ch. 12 in the Bangor area for Adelphia customers).

Adelphia is also carrying all of MPBN’s tournament coverage on digital channels 180 (Bangor) and 181 (Augusta). On regular cable, Bangor area viewers can see game action on MPBN (Ch. 13) as well as Channel 10. In addition, all Augusta game broadcasts will air in Bangor on channel 21.

“Without their assistance, those games would not have been shown to local audiences and our phones would have rung,” Morin said.

That’s not to say MPBN won’t be getting barraged with calls anyway.

“We’re getting calls wondering about the schedule already,” said Morin. “If there’s one point I can make, as confusing as the channel assignments can be, the best place to find the listings are on www.MPBN.net, and just click on the tournament basketball link.”

Having all four classes in play at the same time at three different locations – the Bangor Auditorium, the Augusta Civic Center and Portland’s Cumberland County Civic Center – means there will be numerous conflicts with as many as three games occurring at the same time.

With its new digital broadcast facilities and digital cable format allowing it to broadcast four different programs at once on four different channels (on digital cable), the potential scheduling conflicts of having three games played at once isn’t a factor. Limitations on MPBN’s manpower and equipment are, however.

“The main factors for us are manpower and equipment resources,” Morin explained. “We’re not limited by geography, but even if we had more personnel, we still would need another production truck and three more cameras to do all the games, and that’s not all.”

As it is, even with MBPN’s total number of telecasts shrinking from 56 each of the last three years to 44 this year, network officials were still forced to make some tough decisions as to who got left out of the glare of the camera lights.

“We’re doing six days of games over an 11-day period,” Morin said. “On three of those days, we’re broadcasting 10 games total and I don’t think we’ve ever done that many in one day before.”

“It’s such a group effort, we literally have people from our finance office using cameras, running cables and all kinds of things,” he added. “Our whole company totals 135 employees and between 40 and 50 will be involved in the production.”

Even Bangor CBS affiliate WABI (Channel 5) never did more than eight games in one day when it aired all of the Eastern Maine Class A tournament, from quarterfinals to state finals.

“We had to pick two out of three locales to do the games from, and the decision came down to relative distance between the fans and the arena,” Morin explained. “Several of the teams are in the Portland area and all are generally geographically closer to Portland whereas there are teams, say like Madawaska, that are four hours away from Bangor.

“And traditionally, we’ve always been about the B-C-D tournaments, so that’s a consideration as well.”

The East and West Class A quarterfinal, semifinal and final games will not be aired on TV in Western Maine due to manpower.

“The good news is if you’re an Eastern Maine fan, you’re going to see all your favorite teams on TV,” Morin said.

Andrew Neff can be reached at 990-8205, 1-800-310-8600 or at aneff@bangordailynews.net

Bouncing around the airwaves

Eastern Maine Tournament coverage

TV

Maine Public Broadcasting Network – WMEB Orono (broadcast channel 9, Ch. 20 digital cable), WMED Calais (Ch. 13, Ch. 10 digital), WMEM Presque Isle (Ch. 10, Ch. 20), WCBB Augusta (Ch. 10, Ch. 17), WMEA Biddeford (Ch. 26, Ch. 45):

Adelphia cable – Bangor (Ch. 10 and 13)

Adelphia digital cable – Bangor (Ch. 180) and Augusta (Ch. 181):

Eastern Maine Classes A, B, C, and D regional semifinals and finals; Western Maine Class C and D semifinals and finals; Classes B, C, and D state finals

Adelphia cable – Bangor (Ch. 21), Waterville/Oxford/North Anson (Ch. 74), Augusta/Sebago/Kennebunk/Lewiston/Rumford (Ch. 38), Newcastle/Rockland (Ch. 11), Vinalhaven (Ch. 2)

Western Maine Classes C and D regional semifinals and finals

Adelphia and Time Warner Cable access channels:

Class A state finals

RADIO

Lighthouse Sports Network – WHCF Bangor (88.5 FM) and Presque Isle (102.7 FM), WHMX Lincoln (105.7 FM) and Waterville (100.5 FM)

All games involving Presque Isle, Caribou, Mattanawcook Academy, Bangor Christian, Schenck, Lee Academy, Central, Madawaska, and Deer Isle-Stonington

WZON Bangor (620 AM):

All games not conflicting with University of Maine basketball and hockey games

WMCM Rockland (103.3 FM):

All Eastern Maine Class B games involving Maranacook, Medomak Valley, Maine Central Institute and Mount View, Winslow, Rockland, Belfast, Waterville, and Camden Hills

WRKD Rockland (1450 AM), WIGY Madison (97.5 FM), WFAU Gardiner (1280 AM):

All Eastern Maine Class A and Western Classes C and D

WDME Dover-Foxcroft (103.1 FM)

All games involving Dexter, Central, Greenville, Piscataquis, and Penquis

WHOU Houlton (100.1 FM) and WHOU Internet (www.whoufm.com):

All games involving Houlton, Hodgdon, Greater Houlton Christian Academy, Ashland, Central Aroostook, Katahdin, Presque Isle, Southern Aroostook, and Washburn

WSYY Millinocket (1240 AM):

All games involving Stearns and Schenck

WCXU Caribou (97.7 FM), WCXX Madawaska (102.3 FM), W276AY Fort Kent (103.1 FM) radio

All games involving Aroostook County teams