10 Facts About SportsChannel

SportsChannel is the collective name for a former group of regional sports networks in the United States that was owned by Cablevision, which from 1988 until the group's demise, operated it as a joint venture with NBC.

At its peak, SportsChannel operated nine networks serving several of the nation's largest cities including New York City, Los Angeles, Chicago and Philadelphia.

Also, in 1987 SportsChannel Florida was launched, initially with programming from local college teams and out-of-market MLB games that SportsChannel already had rights to through its other networks.

In 1988, SportsChannel would make its largest television deal, gaining national television rights for the National Hockey League from ESPN.

Weeks after deal was announced SportsChannel would discontinue its national programming in favor of Fox's programming and discontinued NewSport, replacing it with American Sports Classics, a network focusing on replays of past sporting events and historical sports documentaries.

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Five of the seven other remaining SportsChannel networks relaunched as member networks of Fox Sports Net later that week.

The name SportsChannel America was sometimes applied to the group as a whole.

SportsChannel America aired the professional wrestling show UWF Fury Hour on Monday nights from 1990 to 1991, and later aired the live UWF Blackjack Brawl special in 1994.

SportsChannel Philadelphia carried ECW Hardcore TV, a syndicated wrestling program of the now-defunct Philadelphia-based Extreme Championship Wrestling promotion from the program's debut in 1993 until the channel shut down in 1997.

One problem that arose with the deal was that SportsChannel America was available only in a few major markets and reached only one-third of the households that ESPN covered, limiting the national availability of its NHL coverage.