Life From Final Four: Big East's Digital Push Reaches the Big Stage New live, digital-exclusive show, BIG EAST Shootaround, brings its breakout brand to San Antonio By Brandon Costa, Director of Digital
Monday, April 2, 2018 - 1:32 pm
Print This Story
Story Highlights
A Final Four run is a huge development not only for the school involved but also for the conference office that supports it. It has been a big year for the Big East, especially in terms of its digital and social efforts.
Most notably, the league made a strong play in the live environment with the debut of a weekly series called BIG EAST Shootaround. With Villanova the favorite heading into tonight's National Championship Game, the show is ending its Season 1 run with an emphatic exclamation point.
A crew, headed by the Big East Director, Digital and Social Content, Brad Zak is onsite here in San Antonio, gathering content and live-streaming shows to Facebook, Twitter, and the Fox Sports Go app. The centerpiece? Special editions of BIG EAST Shootaround.
We were very pleased with the show [this season], says Zak. It's been good for us to build our basketball brand. That was the main goal. We wanted to get out there and differentiate ourselves in the space. We're a league that, since we reinvested ourselves' five years ago, has to find ways to set ourselves apart. This has been a perfect way for us to do it.
From left: The Big East's Ujash Patel and Brad Zak are joined by BIG EAST Shootaround hosts John Fanta and Jay Alter in covering Villanova's fun at the Final Four in San Antonio.
For the Final Four weekend, Zak has served as producer, overseeing creative direction of the Big East's content efforts. He's joined by Coordinator, Digital Production, Ujash Patel, who is acting as director and lead technician. Patel is largely credited with playing a major role in the BIG EAST Shootaround's success both technologically and in establishing a consistent brand. Also here are the show's on-camera hosts, John Fanta and Jay Alter.
The conference saw consistent growth for BIG EAST Shootaround throughout the season. It most notably saw a viewership spike when the show aired live from Cincinnati prior to a top-five matchup between Villanova and Xavier in February, with more than 50,00 viewers tuning in. The show also went live four or five times a day during the Big East Men's Basketball Tournament at Madison Square Garden.
According to Zak, he and his team have been pleasantly surprised by the numbers and engagement that the show has seen on Periscope (Twitter). He notes that it's easy for school accounts to easily share and direct their followers to the show in real time.
Typically, when the show is aired from the conference's offices in New York City, Zak and Patel use the encoder in their NewTek TC1 production switcher to split the streams and send the show to its multiple destinations. At the Final Four, however, the digital team did not want the stress of potentially unreliable connectivity at either the Alamodome or the Villanova team hotel. So the show is being fed to New York via a bonded-cellular unit and streamed from there to viewers via the TC1.
Zak notes that the past month has been a learning experience for him and the Big East when it comes to digital strategy. Most significantly, though, he feels that, when a season ends with drama like this, it's best to stay the course.
The best thing you can do, he observes, is have your year-round plan in place and don't deviate from it just because it's a big event. Find what you do really well, stick to it, and just carry that over into the major event. Don't let the moment catch you blindsided.
Most recent headlines
05/01/2027
Worlds first 802.15.4ab-UWB chip verified by Calterah and Rohde & Schwarz to be ...
01/06/2026
January 6 2026, 05:30 (PST) Dolby Sets the New Standard for Premium Entertainment at CES 2026
Throughout the week, Dolby brings to life the latest innovatio...
01/05/2026
January 5 2026, 18:30 (PST) NBCUniversal's Peacock to Be First Streamer to ...
01/04/2026
January 4 2026, 18:00 (PST) DOLBY AND DOUYIN EMPOWER THE NEXT GENERATON OF CREATORS WITH DOLBY VISION
Douyin Users Can Now Create And Share Videos With Stun...
07/01/2026
SVG Summit 2025: All General Sessions Now Available to Watch on SVG PLAYThe SVG Summit celebrated its 20th edition with a loaded agendaBy Brandon Costa, Directo...
07/01/2026
NBCU's Brings Rinkside Live' and Courtside Live' Features to Peaco...
07/01/2026
Spotify is launching a week-long celebration spotlighting creators at the center...
07/01/2026
We know people use Spotify not just to listen, but to share the songs, podcasts, and audiobooks they love with their friends and family. When we launched Messag...
07/01/2026
This week, all eyes are on the podcast industry as the Golden Globes recognizes ...
07/01/2026
Podcasts are stepping onto a new stage this week as the Golden Globes recognize the medium for the first time. To mark this milestone moment, we're hosting ...
07/01/2026
The National Film and Video Foundation (NFVF), in collaboration with a distributor, is commissioning new micro-budget fiction feature films and invites eligible...
07/01/2026
NASA's Space Launch System rocket carrying the Orion spacecraft launches on the Artemis I flight test, Wednesday, Nov. 16, 2022, from Launch Complex 39B at ...
07/01/2026
For the first time ever, new C' variants allow international users to interoperate with U.S. personnel via NSA-certified cryptography....
07/01/2026
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
07/01/2026
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
07/01/2026
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
07/01/2026
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
07/01/2026
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
07/01/2026
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
07/01/2026
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
07/01/2026
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
07/01/2026
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
07/01/2026
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
07/01/2026
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
07/01/2026
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
07/01/2026
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
07/01/2026
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
07/01/2026
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
07/01/2026
Back to All News
The Trailer of Paparazzi King: The 5-Episode Docuseries Coming...
07/01/2026
Back to All News
Netflix Supports Warner Bros. Discovery Board's Commitment...
07/01/2026
Back to All News
What Next? Netflix Reveals Series, Films and Games Coming in 2026
Entertainment
07 January 2026
Global
Link copied to clipboard
Download ...
07/01/2026
AI has transformed retail and consumer packaged goods (CPG) operations, enhancin...
06/01/2026
Peacock Bringing Dolby Vision and Dolby Atmos to Live Sports ContentPeacock is the first streamer to embrace Dolbys full suite of advanced picture/sound innovat...
06/01/2026
SVG Europe Audio: Listening to the sounds of powder and ice at Milano Cortina wi...
06/01/2026
Quintar Meta Spatial SDK Integration Promises Next-Level XR ExperiencesBy Ken Kerschbaumer, Editorial Director
Tuesday, January 6, 2026 - 9:41 am
Print This...
06/01/2026
Milano Cortina 2026: BBC Sport Previews Broadcast Ops, Studio Setup, Social Medi...
06/01/2026
Dolby's Jason Power on Elevating Live Sports Through Immersive Audio and HDR...
06/01/2026
DAZN's Global CRO Walker Jacobs on the Streamer's Breakout Year in the U...
06/01/2026
California Dreamin': LA28's SVP of Media Jim Bell Previews the Olympic a...
06/01/2026
One Month Out From Winter Olympics Opening Ceremony, NBC Sports in Final Prep fo...
06/01/2026
Advanced HDR by Technicolor and Zinwell Integrated onto ATSC 3.0 Conversion Boxe...
06/01/2026
Fox Sports President and COO Mark Silverman Shifts to Consulting RoleBy Ken Kerschbaumer, Editorial Director
Tuesday, January 6, 2026 - 2:37 pm
Print This S...
06/01/2026
Spotify is launching a week-long celebration spotlighting creators at the center...
06/01/2026
Lorde. A$AP Rocky. JENNIE. Baby Keem. KATSEYE. That's just a taste of who...
06/01/2026
In a live broadcast, L3Harris CFO and Missile Solutions President Ken Bedingfield joined Morgan Brennan on CNBCs Closing Bell: Overtime. Bedingfield discussed...
06/01/2026
First-of-its-kind SSP capability delivers program-level insight and brand suitab...
06/01/2026
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
06/01/2026
Share Share by:
Copy link
Facebook
X
Whatsapp
Pinterest
Flipboard...
Life From Final Four: Big East's Digital Push Reaches the Big Stage New live, digital-exclusive show, BIG EAST Shootaround, brings its breakout brand to San Antonio By Brandon Costa, Director of Digital 
