TV Schedules Offer Something for Everyone

Here’s a rundown of where to watch college games this season:

ABC

What’s new this season is a weekly 5 p.m. series. It’s being billed as “Saturday Night Football” because it is on in prime time in the East. The opening game features Notre Dame at Georgia Tech. The second game Sept. 9 will be No. 1-ranked Ohio State at defending national champion Texas.

Five USC games are part of the series: against Nebraska in a national telecast Sept. 16; at Arizona in a regional telecast Sept. 23; against Arizona State in a regional telecast Oct. 14; against California in a regional telecast Nov. 18 and against Notre Dame in a national telecast Nov. 25.

UCLA’s game at California on Nov. 4 is a regional telecast.

The announcers for the series will be Brent Musburger, Bob Davie and Kirk Herbstreit. Lisa Salters will be the sideline reporter.

ABC will continue to televise Pacific 10, Big Ten, Big 12, Atlantic Coast Conference and Big East games, generally on a regional basis, at 12:30 p.m. each Saturday. ABC also has the Capital One Bowl and the Rose Bowl.

ESPN Networks

Each Saturday, ESPN will have games generally at 9:45 a.m. and 4:45 p.m., although USC’s opener at Arkansas on Saturday on ESPN is scheduled for 5:45 p.m.

ESPN2 will have Saturday games, usually at 9 a.m. and 4 p.m.

ESPN will have Thursday games at 4:30 p.m., beginning with Auburn at South Carolina on Sept. 28. ESPN and ESPN2 will also offer regular Friday night telecasts, plus games on selected Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Sundays.

ESPNU, for the second season, will have four games each Saturday, generally at 9 a.m., 12:30 p.m., 4 p.m. and 7 p.m.

ESPN’s pregame show, “College GameDay,” has been expanded 30 minutes to two hours and will generally begin at 7 a.m.

ESPN will offer what it calls “Full Circle” coverage of the Florida State-Miami game Monday night at 5. There will be traditional coverage on ESPN and ESPN HD, with Mike Patrick and Todd Blackledge announcing. ESPN2 and ESPN2 HD will offer multi-camera, mosaic-style coverage. ESPNU and broadband ESPN360 will offer SkyCam angles and commentary and statistics. ESPN Deportes and ESPN International will have Spanish-language and worldwide coverage.

ESPN360 will have at least two streamlined games each Saturday, ESPN Classic will have a limited schedule that includes select Army home games and the Southwestern Conference championship game Dec. 16.

The ESPN GamePlan pay package offers out-of-market ABC regional telecasts. The cost, beginning today, is $129 for the season or $21.95 per weekend. There is also on online package that offers live streamlined telecasts of all ESPN, ESPN2 and ESPN regional offerings. Information can be obtained on ESPN.com by searching “GamePlan.”

Fox Cable

FSN, Fox’s cable network, will offer Pac-10 and Big 12 games not televised by ABC or an ESPN network. The Big 12 games will generally begin at 9 a.m. or 9:30 a.m. and the Pacific 10 games at 12:30 p.m., 3:30 p.m. or 4 p.m.

FSN’s first Big 12 telecast, Saturday at 9 a.m., will be North Texas at Texas. The Pac-10 opener, with Barry Tompkins and Petros Papadakis announcing, will be Utah at UCLA at 4 p.m.

FSN Prime Ticket will have at least two UCLA games -- Sept. 9 against Rice and Nov. 18 at Arizona State. And the local network will have USC’s homecoming game, Nov. 11 against Oregon.

Fox College Sports, a three-channel service available on some cable sports pay tiers, has 96 out-of-market games scheduled for this season.

CBS

The network will televise Southeastern Conference games, beginning with a doubleheader Sept. 16: Louisiana State at Auburn at 12:30 p.m. and Florida at Tennessee at 5 p.m. The announcers will be CBS veteran Verne Lundquist and Gary Danielson, who moved over from ABC this year.

CBS will also carry the Army-Navy game and the SEC championship game Dec. 2, and two bowl games, the Sun and Gator.

TBS

The Turner Broadcasting network will televise 11 games over nine weeks involving teams from the Pac-10 and Big 12. Saturday, TBS has a doubleheader -- Alabama Birmingham at Oklahoma at 4 p.m. with Ron Thulin and Charles Davis announcing, followed by Brigham Young at Arizona at 7:15 p.m., with Chip Caray and Tom Ramsey announcing.

CSTV

This 4-year-old college sports channel, now owned by Viacom, CBS’ parent company, will offer more than 45 games involving Navy and teams from the Mountain West Conference, Conference USA and Division I-AA. CSTV televised the Texas El Paso-San Diego State game Thursday night. Upcoming telecasts include Colorado at Colorado State and Texas Tech at Texas El Paso on Sept. 9, Oklahoma State at Houston on Sept. 23, Rutgers at Navy on Oct. 14, and Notre Dame at Air Force on Nov. 11.

NBC

The Notre Dame network will televise seven home games this season, including Penn State on Sept. 9, Michigan on Sept. 16 and UCLA on Oct. 21. The announcers are Tom Hammond and Pat Haden.

OLN/Versus

OLN, which will change its name to Versus on Sept. 25, will televise eight Mountain West games, beginning with Texas Tech at Texas Christian Sept. 16 at 2:30 p.m. Announcers will be Gary Bender and Glenn Parker.

Fox Sports

The big Fox network that televises the NFL and World Series has picked up the Bowl Championship Series title games to be played in January 2007, 2008 and 2009. This season’s championship game will be played Jan. 8 at Glendale, Ariz.

Through a four-year, $330-million deal with the BCS announced in November 2004, Fox got the three title games and the Orange, Fiesta and Sugar Bowls through January 2010. ABC still has the Rose Bowl game, and in 2010 it will televise that game and the BCS title game, to be played at the Rose Bowl a week later.

larry.stewart@latimes.com