{"id":464229,"date":"2025-09-30T22:44:11","date_gmt":"2025-09-30T22:44:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/464229\/"},"modified":"2025-09-30T22:44:11","modified_gmt":"2025-09-30T22:44:11","slug":"wnba-sets-rights-deal-with-versant-for-usa-network-games","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/464229\/","title":{"rendered":"WNBA Sets Rights Deal With Versant for USA Network Games"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tA year ago, the WNBA<\/a> signed an 11-year media rights deal<\/a> with NBCUniversal<\/a> (along with Disney and Amazon) that included a slate of games on its USA Network<\/a> cable channel.<\/p>\n

\n\tA few months later, NBCU announced plans to spin off USA Network and other cable assets into a separate company, eventually named Versant<\/a>. With the pending spinoff, Versant<\/a> has now signed its own deal with the WNBA to keep the league on USA.<\/p>\n

\n\tLike NBCUniversal\u2019s deal, Versant\u2019s will run from 2026-36. It will also increase the number of games on USA to 50 per year \u2014 the language in the 2024 deal said all NBCU platforms would host about 50 regular-season games, split among NBC, Peacock and USA. The Versant deal will feature Wednesday doubleheaders during the regular season and some postseason games. <\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cWe\u2019re incredibly proud to expand our multi-year partnership with the WNBA,\u201d said\u00a0Matt Hong, head of sports at Versant. \u201cUSA Network will be a destination for WNBA viewers all season long, as we showcase the star power across the league in our marquee Wednesday night doubleheaders and build toward the intensity of the WNBA Playoffs and WNBA Finals.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tAdded WNBA Commissioner Cathy Engelbert, \u201cPartnering with Versant and USA Network marks another significant milestone for the WNBA\u2019s continued growth. As demand for women\u2019s basketball continues to rise, partnerships like this expand the visibility and accessibility of our game. By establishing a weekly primetime destination for fans, this agreement will showcase the excitement of the WNBA to more households than ever before and further elevate the incredible athletes in this league.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tVersant will make women\u2019s sports a key part of its programming, having also signed a rights deal with the fledgling League One Volleyball<\/a>. Golf Channel airs LPGA Tour events as well.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cNot all women\u2019s sports are the same, but where there is some pattern recognition is that when our team looks at sports or leagues with high growth trajectories, like we spoke about with LOVB, quite a few of the sports in the leagues that we identify with high growth potential happen to be women\u2019s sports,\u201d Hong told The Hollywood Reporter after the League One deal was announced. \u201cSo that really drives our interest in this women\u2019s sports strategy, and properties such as LOVB, the WNBA and the LPGA.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A year ago, the WNBA signed an 11-year media rights deal with NBCUniversal (along with Disney and Amazon)…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":464230,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5311],"tags":[61089,49,978,659,155131,155132,51764],"class_list":{"0":"post-464229","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-united-states","8":"tag-nbcuniversal","9":"tag-united-states","10":"tag-us","11":"tag-usa","12":"tag-usa-network","13":"tag-versant","14":"tag-wnba"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115295673703977231","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/464229","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=464229"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/464229\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/464230"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=464229"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=464229"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=464229"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}