Following up on a report from last month, the current Big East announced a new television deal with ESPN on Monday that will run through 2019-20. The Big East’s current deal with ESPN ends this year with 2013-14 serving as a bridge year before football, basketball and Olympic sports come under one agreement in 2014.
The amount of the deal wasn’t disclosed, but ESPN’s Brett McMurphy, who would know, reports the seven-year deal will be worth $126 million over the life of the deal. It was previously reported that the deal would be in the neighborhood of $130 million.
With the seven Catholic basketball schools gone to form their own conference while retaining the Big East name, the football side now has the task of rebranding and renaming its conference. As of last week, Big East commissioner Mike Aresco said that it is “very unlikely” the new conference will be named the “America 12,” despite previous reports.
The Big East’s football conference championship game will be broadcast on either ABC or ESPN.