Forget Football: It's Basketball This Week as Fox and ESPN Finalize Division of March Madness Conference Rights

29 October 2026

Fox and ESPN are finalizing a split of college basketball television rights for the next cycle—a development that could reshape the sport's national schedule in the run-up to the 2031 media-rights reset. SportBusiness Journal reported last Friday that the conference networks are in the final stages of dividing the inventory.

The deal would end a partnership on college basketball between the networks, under which ESPN owned most of the inventory. Fox got a sizable share of college basketball games with CBS under an initial 2022 deal. But the rights landscape for the sport has fragmented increasingly since then, and a full division of rights is the next logical step.

Take the Big 12. Fox added a portion of its college basketball line-up in a 2022 media extension with ESPN, while reducing its share of men's basketball. That was at first aired on Fox Sports. But later reporting put Fox's inventory at a set number of games. It was an unexpected move: Fox did not have Big 12 basketball rights under the renegotiated 2022 package. CBS had those.

Big Ten basketball rights got their own deal with the 2022 renegotiation. And Fox did games under that too, on Fox and FS1. CBS gave some to ESPN. NBC also got a share.

Right now ESPN is set to televise games on linear, plus streaming. Fox: games across Fox, FS1 and other networks. CBS: a set number of games.

Big East: received membership along with others. They asked for more but did not get it.

Ultimately, the rights split is about strategic positioning ahead of the 2031 reset, and the expansion and fragmentation of the college-basketball calendar, and the rising late-stage buildup for the NCAA Tournament and Women's March Madness, all highlight that the downstream deals are fast-growing strategic terrain.