The NCAA needs to standardize the broadcasting of games for non football sports. Some schools charge per game, some charge per season, some are free. Most are filmed horribly, sometimes feel that a parent with a smart phone using facebook live stream could do a better job. How is it that schools who have all the equipment to broadcast their football games (multiple cameras, HD/4K, etc). cant use that same equipment to broadcast their other sports (in this case, womens soccer) and do a decent job of it. And to then charge for it, while giving horrible coverage is adding insult to injury (yes i know if you are in the P5 confs, that doesn't matter, unless you play someone in say, CUSA, etc)..
Unfortunately most schools don’t have the equipment. All provided by the broadcaster. That said it is incredulous that many schools can’t even provide a live stream. Set up a camera and get an intern or student to get the job done. Nothing worse than following a game on stat travker
Not having equipment is not an excuse.. almost all of these schools D1 wise anyway, have football programs with stadiums that seat 15K or so. and broadcast their football games in HD with multi camera setups, announcers, with replays, etc. All I'm saying is, if you can afford the camera equipment for Football, share the wealth on NON football days to broadcast (even over the internet) with Higher quality and the like...
I watch a lot of games via ESPN, including replays, and I'm grateful to have them as I can watch a lot of SEC, ACC and other matches, so I'm not going to complain too much. That said, the broadcast quality varies quite a bit, depending on whether I am watching a /league/ broadcast or just a school broadcast. If I watch, for example, an SEC /league/ broadcast, I get a fairly decent, quasi-professional broadcast-- two or three cameras (including one or two at field level), a decent announcer and a decent color analyst and some replays during the game, etc. On the other hand, if I watch an SEC+ broadcast, it means the production is by the school itself and it tends to be not very good--often just one camera in or atop the press box and one not-very-good announcer--typically a young guy with very little broadcasting experience. I watched one such game recently, produced by the school, and the one camera seemed to be in some sort of housing that prevented the camera from moving to the far right--and so one could not see any action in the lower-right corner of the field! One couldn't see a player kicking the ball on corner kicks from that area. A bit frustrating but not the end of the world as one could see all that unfolded once the ball got to the goal area. The announcer, young guy, worked very hard but was not very good--the game was not 3 minutes old and he was making sweeping generalizations that were premature and off the mark. Beyond that, he could not keep up with the substitutions at all and lost track of who was on the field. One sub ended up playing 40 minutes and he did not once mention her name! He was better the next game. So it goes... This school has a major communications program and a modern broadcast center for its media/communications students, and so one would think they could do a better job--put a second, on-field camera to use on the production, for example, and find somebody with some real soccer knowledge to be an analyst. It can't be that hard, but maybe there are technical issues of which I am unaware. It is a bit frustrating. I suspect the school broadcasts will improve over time--and they should, because the effort put into making the broadcasts more professional will help the career prospects of those who work on the broadcasts. For now I'm grateful just to get a basic view of the action!