April 3, 2012

Women’s National Title Showdown
Baylor will play 2011 national runner-up Notre Dame for the 2012 NCAA Division I Women’s Basketball Championship title Tuesday, April 3, at 8:30 p.m. on ESPN and ESPN3. In addition, ESPN will feature additional content across its platforms, including SportsCenter, espnW, ESPN.com,  ESPNEWS, WatchESPN and ESPN International.

Trey Wingo, with Kara Lawson and Carolyn Peck, will host the telecast from the arena. Dave O’Brien will have the play-by-play call with Doris Burke.  Rebecca Lobo will work as an on-court analyst, as well as conducting on-court interviews with players and coaches, along with Holly Rowe.

Full Schedule

Downloadable photos from the Semifinals

On the Road at the Men’s Final Four

College basketball fans in more than 200 countries around the world were able to watch the NCAA Men’s Final Four on Saturday, March 31 and Monday, April 2, through exclusive coverage on ESPN International. Here is ESPN America reporter Andrew Joseph doing a postgame interviews with the winners.

On the U…

The Final Four may be over, but college sports are still in full swing and Thursday’s lineup on ESPNU has the star power to prove it. The afternoon grandslam starts with the return of College Football Live and continues with the Frozen Four
live from Tampa straight into College Baseball Live before the SEC Thursday Night Game of the Week.

College Football Live (3:30 p.m.) – kicks off the daily show’s spring season on ESPNU Thursday with host Chris Fowler and analysts Matt Millen and Jeff Galloway.

College Baseball Live (3:30 p.m.) – Host Dari Nowkhah alongside analysts Keith Law and Ben McDonald break down the latest news and highlights from in and around the dugout before the SEC showdown of No. 12 LSU and No. 1 Florida.

ESPN Tournament Challenge Stats Complete
Brackets in ESPN.com’s Men’s Tournament Challenge presented by State Farm and Infiniti USA revealed that 35.1 percent of 6.45 million brackets correctly picked Kentucky to win the title – larger than the 4.7 percent out of 5.9 million brackets that picked Connecticut last year.

President Barack Obama, correctly had Kentucky in the championship game, but picked North Carolina to win it all. He finished in the 63.6 percentile with a final rank of 2,347,421 in the Men’s Tournament.

ESPN’s New MediaZone Launches
It’s a bird. It’s a plane. No, it’s the new ESPNMediaZone! This week, ESPN’s web site for the media, ESPNMediaZone. com, re-launched with a new more efficient and eye-pleasing design. It is your online source for ESPN programming and scheduling information, press releases, bios, photos and more. Bookmark it!

Weekly Game Highlights –
Olympic Sport Coverage

The 2012 Frozen Four live from Tampa features a return of the titans and a round of first-time fighters in the semifinals as the top teams in the NCAA shred their way into the National Championship on Saturday. The legendary hockey voices of Gary Thorne and Barry Melrose will bring color to of every heart-pounding moment of the weekend.
• Thursday (4:30 p.m., ESPNU) – Ferris State and Union take to the ice for the first time at the Frozen Four
• Thursday (8 p.m., ESPN2) – The two schools with a long hockey history look to make their own imprint as Minnesota and top-seeded Boston College face-off
• Saturday (7 p.m., ESPN2) – The semifinal winners will compete for the NCAA Men’s Ice Hockey
Championship title

ESPN networks are the home of two men’s lacrosse battles featuring top-notch teams, including an ACC matchup between No. 1 Virginia at No. 9 North Carolina on Saturday, April 7 (1 p.m., ESPN/ESPN3). Also in action is Albany at No. 3 Johns Hopkins on Thursday, April 5 (7
p.m., ESPNU).

ESPN’s softball coverage continues with action every night this weekend on ESPNU, including two top 25 matchups:
• Friday (8 p.m.) – A clash of the BCS Championship rivals off the football field when No. 23 LSU takes to
the mound at No. 2 Alabama
• Saturday (2 p.m.) – Another SEC match-up between top 25 teams with No. 9 Tennessee at No. 24 Auburn
• Sunday (2 p.m.) – ACC foes Georgia Tech vs. Maryland with Cara Capuano and Michele Smith with
the call

NCAA baseball enters its sixth week with six teams in the top 25 playing on ESPN networks, including the No. 1 and No. 2 teams. The SEC Thursday Night Game of the Week features No. 1 Florida, who will face No. 12 LSU and in the ACC Monday Night on ESPNU continues this week with Wake Forest at Virginia.

Full schedule:
• Thursday (7:30 p.m., ESPNU) – SEC Thursday Night Game of the Week featuring No. 12 LSU at No. 1
Florida
• Saturday (4:30 p.m., ESPNU) – Oklahoma at No. 5 Texas A&M
• Saturday (6 p.m., ESPN3) – No. 2 Florida State at No. 23 Georgia Tech
• Saturday (8 p.m., ESPNU) – Tennessee at No. 10 South Carolina
• Sunday (4 p.m., ESPNU) – Indiana State at Creighton
• Monday (7 p.m., ESPNU) – Wake Forest at Virginia

Spotlight: Hockey Analyst Barry Melrose
ESPN has been covering NCAA men’s ice hockey since its first year in existence, and one man has become a cornerstone of that coverage, is hockey analyst Barry Melrose.

Outside of a coaching career that includes leading the LA Kings to the Stanley Cup Finals for the first time in franchise history, Melrose has been the hockey voice at ESPN for 16 years.

We caught up with Melrose on his way to Tampa and learned a few things worth sharing:

You’ve called Frozen Four matchups for years now, what do you look forward to about the event?
I really enjoy the Frozen Four. It’s always a reminder that the NHL playoffs just around the corner.

Any Frozen Four moments that you can reflect back on?
The one I remember best is when Miami was beating Boston University late in game by two goals and Boston
scored one then pulled goalie and tied it up. They beat Miami in overtime. It was a terrible loss for Miami.

What players should NHL fans be keeping a close eye on this weekend?
Nick Bjugstad (Minnesota) and Chris Kreider (Boston College).