Fortunately for basketball fans of UA and the Pac-12, there's still plenty of time for the Pac-12 Network television issues to settle down.
There was another sign today it may not be a problem by November for most fans around the country with satellite or cable access. The Pac-12 announced via email at 12:07 a.m. today that DISH Network has picked up the Pac-12 Networks' national feed and will carry any other games on alternate channels.
While there still isn't a deal with DirecTV, the Pac-12 Network's Brenna Webb said via email that today's deal does not preclude DirecTV from striking one. Certainly, DISH's contract puts additional pressure on DirecTV to do so, although the conference no doubt would like the exposure that DirecTV (and its many sports-oriented subscribers) can offer.
One interesting note with the DISH deal is that any games conflicting with the national channel will be placed on overflow channels. So DISH won't have all seven Pac-12 Networks fulltime (i.e. Pac-12 national, Pac-12 Arizona, etc.), unlike the current satellite packages that carry all the Fox Sports Net regional channels.
While DISH appears committed to showing all football and men's basketball games, it will be interesting to see what happens with the Networks' other regional content.
As part of today's deal, DISH also gets a sponsorship package that will result in its logo popping up around the conference schools and events.
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CBSSports.com calls the Rondae Jefferson visit to Arizona one of the biggest this weekend.
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After some lighthearted recruiting at the Democratic National Convention (asking during his speech for 7-footers to "give me a call"), Craig Robinson headed back to Corvallis for some campus recruiting.
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Jay Bilas breaks down three of the Pac-12's top freshmen: Shabazz Muhammad, Kyle Anderson and Josh Scott.
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