March Madness 2022: Fans in the Stands, Onsite Production Are Welcome Sight to CBS, Turner at NCAA Men's Tourney 2022 coverage includes more on-court coaches interviews, deeper access to the action By Brandon Costa, Director of Digital
Thursday, March 17, 2022 - 11:46 am
Print This Story | Subscribe
Story Highlights
It's beginning to look a lot like 2019.
As COVID restrictions have been rolling back nation-wide, the biggest events on the sports calendar are looking a lot more like they did prior to the pandemic for broadcasters. Last weekend's THE PLAYERS Championship, for example, may have been dogged by weather, but it was a full-fledged onsite production by NBC Sports and the PGA TOUR, with more than 350 crew members on the course and in the compound.
The feeling is familiar for CBS Sports and Turner Sports. The partners are ready to tackle one of the year's biggest sports productions: the NCAA Men's Basketball Tournament. The duo is back together to execute their production, operation, and distribution partnership to deliver live coverage of all 67 games from the 2022 NCAA Division I Men's Basketball Championship across four national television networks - TBS, CBS, TNT, and truTV - and streaming on March Madness Live.
The first round of the 2022 NCAA Men's Basketball Tournament tips off on Thursday.
We're back to our pre-COVID setup, says Harold Bryant, executive producer/EVP, CBS Sports. The fans are back in the arenas with their energy. All of our crews are back at the remotes. We're back to producing and covering great games, and it feels good to get back to what we know and put on a great show for the viewers. We adapted well last year. What we pulled off was, I think, pretty amazing, but now we're back to what we do best.
Following Tuesday and Wednesday's First Four games in Dayton, OH, CBS and Turner have crews spread across eight regional sites: Indianapolis; Buffalo; Portland, OR; Fort Worth; Pittsburgh; Greenville, SC; San Diego; and Milwaukee. That means trucks, announcers, crews, the works - all back to working at the venue. No remote-production workflows that became essential for the sports-production community over the past two years.
[I'm] really excited about, what I would refer to as the normalization of the tournament,' says Craig Barry, EVP/chief content officer, Turner Sports. We're of a fan-first mentality, and it's hard to be fan-first when there's no fans in the building. Now we'll get the energy back in the building, which translates to energy in the trucks and energy in the studio. We're looking forward to reuniting our partnership [with CBS Sports] in a more traditional way and getting back to putting on the best show possible for this year's tournament.
Fewer restrictions also mean a return to more access. That's a fact that both CBS and Turner want to leverage in a big way within their game coverage this year. Most notably, on-court interviews with coaches is an addition to the game plan. Those interviews will be done by the sideline reporter and occur coming back from commercial break at each of the 12:00 and 8:00 TV timeouts.
Not only are we back to normal, says Bryant. We're trying new things.
Barry notes that coaches will also be made more available to participate in interviews with the studio crews in either New York or Atlanta during blocks of time between games.
As COVID dissipates, he says, I think one of the things that [our coverage] has been missing most is this ability to have access. [We] live to get down and bring the fan as close to the court, to the game, to the players, to the coaches as possible. We really want to emphasize that.
Bryant estimates that each first- and second-round game will average about 15 cameras. NEP Broadcasting's Fletcher division is providing Above the Rim robo cameras to eight of the regional sites: Dayton, Milwaukee, Buffalo, Pittsburgh, San Diego, Indianapolis, Fort Worth, and Portland.
Graphics-wise, every site will have the ability to use enhanced on-court graphics, like the virtual shot clock that is inserted onto the court inside the free-throw circle.
In terms of game distribution, this is TBS's year to carry the big games on Final Four weekend in New Orleans. TBS will televise 21 games: the National Championship, Final Four Semifinals, Elite 8, Sweet 16, and first- and second-round games. CBS, meanwhile, will broadcast 21 games: Elite 8, Sweet 16, and first and second rounds. truTV will carry a total of 13 games: the First Four and first and second rounds. TNT will air 12 first- and second-round matchups.
For the first time since 2019, it's a full slate of hoops complete with fans, bands, buzzer beaters, and everything that makes March Madness the event that U.S. sports fans love. For the crews delivering it to homes across the country, it's a thrilling return to normalcy.
[During COVID], there was a lot of innovation around how we did games. We did full REMIs, we did half crews; we did announcers at the site, announcers in the studio. You always want to learn from the experiences that you have, and what I will say is that nothing's as comprehensive as having everybody onsite. I'm looking forward to creating a lot of access, and the editorial narrative is going to be on point as well, because everybody's back in place.
So, yeah, we're really excited to get back at it.
Most recent headlines
05/01/2027
Worlds first 802.15.4ab-UWB chip verified by Calterah and Rohde & Schwarz to be ...
06/09/2026
June 9 2026, 23:00 (PDT) Dolby and MagentaTV Bring Fans Closer to the FIFA Worl...
04/08/2026
Dalet, a leading technology and service provider for media-rich organizations, t...
04/07/2026
April 7 2026, 19:00 (PDT) Detective Conan: Fallen Angel of the Highway Opens in...
15/06/2026
Detach from Direct-Attached: How Remote Editing with EVO Keeps Creative Teams Mo...
14/06/2026
Library captures 1960s R&B/pop drum sound
Following on from their recent wave of plug-in effects, Iconic Instruments have just launched an all-new virtual d...
14/06/2026
HBO Comedy Rooster Shot with URSA Cine 17K 65
Brie Clayton June 14, 2026
0 Comments
Large format brings viewers intimately close to characters.
Black...
13/06/2026
Latest expansion pack includes 252 presets
Devious Machines have recently introduced another expansion for their powerful multi-effects plug-in, Infiltrator...
13/06/2026
Create custom DAW/plug-in controllers using prompts
MetaGrid have recently introduced an all-new AI Builder function to their touchscreen-based control surf...
13/06/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
13/06/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
12/06/2026
YES Network and The Gotham Sports App will air seven Athletes Unlimited Softball...
12/06/2026
The United Football League will host its FAST Innovation Suite at the 2026 United Bowl presented by Credit One Bank on Saturday, June 13 at 3:00 p.m. ET at Audi...
12/06/2026
PTZOptics and LayerJot will present live demonstrations at InfoComm 2026 showing how natural-language AI prompting, robotic camera control, and on-device comput...
12/06/2026
MultiDyne Video and Fiber Optic Systems will exhibit at InfoComm 2026, featuring...
12/06/2026
Ateme has announced that Eurovision Services is using Ateme's software-based frame-rate conversion technology for international live event workflows. The de...
12/06/2026
Bitmovin and Simplestream have announced a partnership with Xperi to simplify the launch of OTT streaming services on TiVo OS smart TVs and devices. The collabo...
12/06/2026
Net Insight has announced that a multinational technology company is deploying a...
12/06/2026
MLB Players Inc., the business arm of the MLB Players Association, has announced a partnership with Athletes First to develop and sell brand partnerships across...
12/06/2026
Guntermann and Drunck (G&D) and VuWall have announced the CommandKeyboard-Advanc...
12/06/2026
Comcast Smart Solutions announces a new smart technology deployment with Major L...
12/06/2026
Elevation Worship completed the initial leg of its Elevation Nights 2026 tour ...
12/06/2026
AJA Video Systems has announced KONA IP25 support for Colorfront Transkoder and ...
12/06/2026
Audinate Group Limited (ASX: AD8) will exhibit at InfoComm 2026 (Booth C7321, Ce...
12/06/2026
Pac-12 Commissioner Teresa Gould has announced the appointment of Scott Adametz as Chief Technology Officer. The Pac-12 describes the hire as the first CTO appo...
12/06/2026
Grass Valley has announced AMPP Edge Live, a production system combining Grass Valley hardware, NVIDIA Blackwell GPU acceleration, and AMPP OS in a single platf...
12/06/2026
At one time a trailblazer with the launch of the Longhorn Network, the Universit...
12/06/2026
Ratings Roundup is a rundown of recent rating news and is derived from press rel...
12/06/2026
Chyron has announced PAINT 10.4, an update to its illustrated replay and sports ...
12/06/2026
SVP, Production, Mark Gross: With the new schedule, with not having every Sunday night, it has given us an opportunity to take a step back and reimagine what o...
12/06/2026
For Televisa Technical Engineering Manager Roberto N nez Ibarra and the small team of 12 technicians and two production personnel at the IBC things are already ...
12/06/2026
Simple Steps to Better Acoustics - Taming The Small Room
Most of us mix in spare rooms and small spaces, where the acoustics fight us at every turn. At Gear...
12/06/2026
Latest addition expands vintage-inspired effects palette
Meris' Ottobit pedal range draws its inspiration from vintage gaming consoles, and the latest a...
12/06/2026
Soundbox-based chamber strings series expanded
Sonora Cinematic have just announced the launch of the second instalment in their Soundbox-based chamber stri...
12/06/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
12/06/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
12/06/2026
AJA Announces KONA IP25 Integration with Colorfront Software
Brie Clayton June 12, 2026
0 Comments
Collaboration enables uncompressed SMPTE ST 2110 I/O ...
12/06/2026
URSA Cine 12K LF Used to Create Visuals for STUTS' K-Arena Concert
Brie Clayton June 12, 2026
0 Comments
Organic visuals projected on a giant scre...
12/06/2026
MTI FILM Acquires Mango New Edit, Expanding its Global Post-Production Services ...
12/06/2026
AI Point Tracking Speeds Up Complex VFX Tracks in Mocha Pro
Jessie Electa Petrov June 12, 2026
0 Comments
The 2026.5 release adds automatic point trac...
12/06/2026
Bitmovin, a provider of video streaming solutions, has partnered with Simplestream, a provider of OTT and broadcast solutions, and technology provider Xperi, to...
12/06/2026
Leostream Corporation, creator of the world-leading Leostream Remote Desktop Access Platform, today announced Jigsaw24, a leading B2B IT solutions provider wit...
12/06/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
12/06/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
12/06/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
12/06/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
12/06/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
12/06/2026
How Aussie indie games and screen are levelling up with IP 11 June 2026
Ari Harrison, Pro Jank Footy
Head of Games Joey Egger and Ari Harrison of Umbrella sha...
12/06/2026
AgentPerf from Artificial Analysis, the industry's first agentic AI benchmark, gives developers, enterprises and infrastructure providers a clear way to com...
March Madness 2022: Fans in the Stands, Onsite Production Are Welcome Sight to CBS, Turner at NCAA Men's Tourney 2022 coverage includes more on-court coaches interviews, deeper access to the action By Brandon Costa, Director of Digital 
