Before the Terrapins Kick Off, You Need to Log On

As college football fans in the area enjoy a plethora of viewing options each Saturday -- perhaps more than ever before -- one team has been increasingly absent from the weekly menu of televised games: Maryland.

When the Terrapins play at Wake Forest on Saturday, it will mark the fourth time in six games this season that a Maryland game is not on television. Like the Terrapins' other three non-televised games, the only way fans can watch Maryland on Saturday is to power up their computers and stare at a monitor for more than three hours.

The new, unofficial television home of the Terrapins is ESPN360.com, a broadband service that streams games live on the Internet. Some fans are grateful for the free service that enables them to watch games that otherwise would be impossible to see from home. Others say it is simply inadequate.

For Maryland fans, a laptop is now as essential as a red-and-black jersey. Ben Shlesinger, 28, a longtime Terrapins fan from Rockville, appreciates the ability to watch Maryland from any corner of the country but added, "With 360 being the obvious graveyard for games ESPN does not want on air, the Terps deserve better."

Last season, two Maryland games -- home games against North Carolina State and Eastern Michigan -- were seen only on ESPN360. Through the first half of this season, only two -- the season opener at California on ESPN2 and the Oct. 3 game against Clemson on ESPNU -- have been televised live.

Brian Ullmann, a senior associate athletic director at Maryland, said fans occasionally send e-mails calling school officials "idiots" for not wanting Maryland's games televised. Ullmann, who has no say in the matter, said school officials ideally want all games televised, adding that with ESPN360 sometimes as a last resort, "If you can stomach watching on a computer screen, it's not that bad."

A pecking order exists for networks that look to match the best games with the most-watched channels. ABC, ESPN or ESPN2, which are owned by the Walt Disney Co., have the opportunity to select games hosted by ACC teams, usually one or two per week. Raycom, which syndicates games to local television stations, gets to pick one ACC game. And ESPN can put any other ACC game on ESPNU. ESPN360 is last on the network food chain.

Last season, 12 games involving ACC teams -- most from early in the season -- were broadcast on ESPN360, said Michael Kelly, the ACC's associate commissioner for football. This season, 18 have already been shown via ESPN360. During nonconference play, when there are six to nine games involving ACC teams each Saturday, television officials run out of windows on traditional networks.

"When you get further into the season, when there are less games, there is going to be less use of 360," said Kelly, who pointed to the Oct. 17 schedule, which has no ACC games on ESPN360. "Early in the year, when we have nine games in our control, and some of the games that may not be as compelling as others, before it would have been totally dark."

ESPN360 is available in more than 50 million households, and its distribution has more than doubled in 2009. By comparison, ESPN and ESPN2 are available in more than 97 million households, and ESPNU is available in more than 47 million households.

"There are a lot of good games that just cannot fit on a linear network," ESPN360 vice president Damon Phillips said. "It is really a numbers game. What we have done is tried to be part of the solution."

ESPN360 is available at no cost to fans who receive their high-speed Internet connection from any one of several affiliated service providers, including AT&T, Verizon, Cox and Comcast, which added ESPN360 to its Internet service in May. That enabled most Maryland fans with a high-speed Internet connection to have access, which Ullmann said makes the service a "little bit better now, [but] it still does not replace being on television."