RBR and TVBR have been getting announcements from stations in Boston going all out for Sunday’s Super bowl in Phoenix, which they hope will cap an undefeated season for the New England Patriots.
WCVB-TV has been airing special programming leading up to the big weekend. On Sunday, since it is an ABC affiliate, WCVB won’t actually have the game broadcast, but it will air its own “Pursuit of Perfection” post-game show at 10:30 pm.
WFXT-TV, which does have the live broadcast from Fox, is happily billing itself as “New England Patriots Headquarters.”
New England is bigger than just the Boston market. In Providence, LIN’s duopoly has sent Internet journalist Dan Haggerty along with its news and sports crews to Phoenix to focus on original coverage for the stations’ websites. Among other things, he’ll be interviewing local fans who’ve made the trek to Arizona. LIN has the game broadcast on Fox WNAC-TV, but is also going heavy with Super Bowl coverage on CBS affiliate WPRI-TV.
WAAF’s Hill-Man Morning Show has been originating live from the NFL Media Center in Phoenix, with a wrap-up show set for Monday after the Super Bowl.
Tom Doyle of WROR-FM’s Loren & Wally Morning Show wrote a song, "Patriots are 16 & 0." Video has been added by BostonSportz.com and the song has been viewed hundreds of thousands of times on YouTube.
“This is, by far, the most important Super Bowl of all time,” declared Jason Wolfe, Vice President of Programming at WEEI-AM. His station launched what it termed a “360 Degree” approach to coverage, including not only audio, but visual, text and on-site experiences for WEEI’s audience and advertisers. WEEI has also been broadcasting live from Phoenix 10 am to 6 pm daily this week, with 33 straight hours of pre-Super Bowl programming planned this weekend, followed by 26 hours of post-game programming.
The New Englanders are going crazy over what they hope and expect will be a historic perfect season for the Patriots. No doubt radio and TV stations in New York are also going all out to boost the hometown Giants, but they haven’t been sending us the details.
RBR/TVBR observation: So, what will everyone other than Fox be airing while most of the nation’s eyeballs are glued to what could well be a Super Bowl that breaks the all-time ratings record? Not surprisingly, we found quite a bit of programming scheduled for various broadcast and cable networks in Sunday primetime that can safely be described as female-oriented. Even ESPN is carrying figure skating.
