Ball State Sports Link will produce its first and second live production of the year to ESPN platforms this weekend as Ball State Soccer returns to the Briner Sports Complex.
After playing seven of their first 10 games on the road, the Cardinals will play five of their next six at home, all in a span of 17 days.
BSU kicks off that stretch Friday, hosting Ohio with a chance to avenge its only loss in conference play a season ago. Sunday’s matchup with Kent State pits the defending MAC regular season champion (Cardinals) against the defending league tournament champion (Golden Flashes).
Both matches will be streamed live on ESPN 3, available in the ESPN and the Watch ESPN apps and on DIRECTV.
Senior Nick Panozzo is the weekend’s executive producer, while junior Connor Nichols is the associate producer. Junior Sam Ahrens will direct.
The broadcast will feature eight cameras and produced from Benny 1, the university’s 40-foot HD production truck.
In the talent booth for both matches is junior John Gordon (play-by-play), senior Aly Kohanowski and graduate student Cheyn Roux.
Kohanowski, a former forward for the Cardinals, played in 19 matches before injuries sidelined her career at Ball State. She’s earning her degree in digital sports production as a member of Sports Link.
Roux, a first-year graduate student in Sports Link, is a former team captain and four-year letter winner in soccer at Capital University. He played in 20 matches and scored 10 goals last year as Capital finished the 2016 campaign with an overall record of 14-4-2 and spent time inside two different Top-25 polls during the regular season.
Senior Matt Craig and junior Alex Thomas will anchor Sports Link’s halftime coverage on ESPN 3, plus will split sideline reporting duties during the matches.
ESPN3 is ESPN’s live multi-screen sports network, a destination that delivers thousands of exclusive sports events annually. It is accessible on computers, smartphones, tablets and streaming devices through WatchESPN and the ESPN app.
The network is currently available nationwide at no additional cost who receive their high-speed Internet connection or video subscription from an affiliated service provider. It is also available at no cost to U.S. college students and U.S.-based military personnel via computers, smartphones and tablets connected to on-campus educational and on-base military broadband and Wi-Fi networks.
In addition to ESPN’s linear networks, DIRECTV customers with a broadband-enabled set top box will also be able to watch. Customers will not need to log in to access this content, as they will be automatically authenticated.
