NBA on NBC

NBA on NBC
Genre	NBA game telecasts
Directed by	(TBD)
Theme music composer	John Tesh
Opening theme	"Roundball Rock"
Ending theme	"Roundball Rock"
Composer(s)	John Tesh
Country of origin	United States
Language(s)	English
No. of seasons	8 (1954–1962 run) 12 (1990–2002 run) 11 planned (2025–2036) 31 (total, including planned)
No. of episodes	39,148
Production
Producer(s)	(TBD)
Animator(s)	(TBD)
Editor(s)	(TBD)
Location(s)	Various NBA arenas (game telecasts) NBC Studios, New York City (studio segments, pre-game and post-game shows)
Camera setup	Multi-camera
Running time	150 minutes or until game ends
Production Company(s)	NBC Sports
Broadcast
Original channel	NBC Peacock
Original run	October 30, 1954 – present

The NBA on NBC is the branding used for presentations of National Basketball Association (NBA) games produced by the NBC television network and their Peacock streaming service in the United States. NBC held broadcast rights from 1954 to 1962 and again from 1990 (when it obtained the rights from CBS) to 2002. During NBC's partnership with the NBA in the 1990s, the league rose to unprecedented popularity, with ratings surpassing the days of Magic Johnson and Larry Bird in the mid-1980s.

From parent company Comcast's purchase of NBC in 2011 until NBC's formal return to NBA broadcasting in 2025, the only representation NBC had with the NBA were games aired on the NBC Sports Regional Networks in the form of game telecasts that aired on a regional basis, featuring local NBA teams that each of the regional networks have respective broadcast rights to air in their designated market. NBC will return to broadcasting the NBA for the 2025–26 season.

Overview

First iteration (1954–1962)

NBC's first tenure with the National Basketball Association began on October 30, 1954, and lasted until April 7, 1962. NBC's very first NBA telecast was a game between the Boston Celtics and Rochester Royals in Rochester.

For the 1954–55 season, Marty Glickman and Lindsey Nelson called all games except on April 9 (Fort Wayne @ Syracuse during the playoffs), when Glickman worked with Jim Gordon. Nelson would later write in his autobiography, Hello Everybody, I'm Lindsey Nelson that NBA commissioner Maurice Podoloff would travel to the televised games and, when NBC needed to get in a commercial, he would go up to one of the coaches and say, "Call a timeout," and they had to, since the commissioner ordered it. On March 19, 1955, during the playoffs, NBC gave the national spotlight to the New York Knicks and rising Boston Celtics at New York's Madison Square Garden.

For the first year of NBC's tenure, the first five weeks of coverage followed a Canadian Football League game. That contract decreed that the network show 13 games (along with presumably the Grey Cup) on Saturday afternoons beginning in late August, and was signed one week after NBC had lost the rights to NCAA football to ABC.

The following year, Lindsey Nelson was paired with Curt Gowdy on commentary for all games except on February 25 (St. Louis @ New York), March 3 (Minneapolis @ Rochester with Nelson working with Joe Lapchick), and March 24 (Fort Wayne @ St. Louis with Nelson working alone). On March 31, 1956, NBC broadcast the first nationally televised NBA Finals game, which was Game 1 of the Philadelphia-Fort Wayne series.

Gowdy and Nelson were retained as the primary broadcast team for NBC in 1956–57 except on March 23 and March 30 (St. Louis @ Boston), when Nelson worked by himself. While the team of Gowdy and Nelson again did most games in 1957–58, Nelson worked the December 14 telecast (Syracuse @ Detroit) with Chick Hearn, who in return, worked the January 11 telecast (Syracuse @ Cincinnati) with Gowdy. For the January 18 telecast (Detroit @ St. Louis), Nelson worked alone while on February 1 (Syracuse @ Minneapolis), Nelson was paired with Bill O'Donnell. Meanwhile, Gowdy worked alone on March 1 (Cincinnati @ Philadelphia).

NBC also during the 1957–58 season, broadcast a game in Detroit between Cincinnati and the Pistons on March 15. It was after this game, on the flight home to Cincinnati, that Maurice Stokes became ill and later suffered a seizure, fell into a coma and was left permanently paralyzed. This was the delayed reaction from having hit his head in a game three days earlier. Stokes died in April 1970.

In the 1958-59 season, Curt Gowdy worked alone on all games except on March 15 (New York @ Syracuse, when Gowdy worked with Bud Palmer), April 5 (Minneapolis @ Boston with Lindsey Nelson). The 1959 NBA All-Star Game marked the first time that the All-Star Game was nationally televised. However, NBC only broadcast the second half at 10 p.m. Eastern Time, in lieu of its Friday Night Fights telecast. The fact that the All-Star Game prior to this, was almost always played on a Tuesday night meant that NBC would have had to sacrifice most, if not all, of their evening programming. In the first few years, that would have meant taking off Milton Berle's program, which was starting to slide, but still would have made more money for the network than a pro basketball game. Plus, NBA owners weren't terribly savvy when it came to working with TV in this era, so they probably refused network requests to put it in a weekend afternoon slot.

During the 1959–60 season, Curt Gowdy worked alone most on Saturday games while Lindsey Nelson worked alone on most Sunday games. Nelson also worked on Saturday April 2 (St. Louis @ Boston) during the playoffs. Marty Glickman meanwhile, worked alone on December 6 (St. Louis @ Cincinnati), January 2–3 (New York Knicks @ Cincinnati and Boston @ Syracuse), February 28 (Philadelphia @ Detroit), March 13 (Philadelphia @ Syracuse), 20 (Boston @ Philadelphia), and 27 (St. Louis @ Boston), and April 3 (Boston @ St. Louis). Finally, Bill O'Donnell worked alone on March 12 (Minneapolis @ Detroit), 19 (St. Louis @ Minneapolis), and 26 (Minneapolis @ St. Louis).

In the 1960-61 season, Lindsey Nelson was alone on all games except when he worked with Bud Palmer on October 22 (New York @ Cincinnati) and 29 (New York @ Detroit), November 26 (Syracuse @ Boston), December 3 (New York @ Syracuse), 10 (Syracuse @ Detroit), and 24 (Detroit @ Boston). Jerry Doggett helped call games on November 5 (Syracuse @ Los Angeles) and 19 (Detroit @ Los Angeles). Marty Glickman contributed to commentary on January 8 (Boston @ St. Louis), 15 (Philadelphia @ Syracuse), 22 (St. Louis @ Cincinnati), and 29 (Philadelphia @ Boston), February 19 (Boston @ Syracuse) and 26 (Boston @ Detroit), March 12 (Boston @ Syracuse), 19 (Syracuse @ Boston), and 26 (Syracuse @ Boston), and April 2 (St. Louis @ Boston).

For NBC's final season of their first stint with the NBA, Bud Palmer worked alone on commentary on all games except for on February 3 (Cincinnati @ New York) and April 7 (Los Angeles @ Boston), when he was paired with Bob Wolff.

NBC's ratings during this time period were lukewarm at best. By 1962, NBA ratings for NBC's Saturday afternoon games dipped to 4.8 (9 million viewers) as compared to Sunday afternoon NFL ratings of 10.4 (15 million viewers). As a matter of fact, CBS was at one point, getting better ratings for their National Hockey League telecasts than NBC was getting with the NBA. One possible factor for the dipping ratings the fact that NBC's 1960–61 schedule placed the three weakest teams--Cincinnati, Syracuse, and Detroit on television a total of 14 times. In comparison, three of the NBA's best teams--Boston, St. Louis, and Philadelphia—appeared on NBC a total of only seven times.

Second iteration (1990–2002)

Background

On November 9, 1989, the NBA reached an agreement with the network worth US$600 million contract to broadcast the league's games for four years, beginning with the 1990–91 season. On April 28, 1993, NBC extended its exclusive broadcast rights to the NBA with a four-year, $750 million contract.

Coverage

NBC's coverage of the NBA began on Christmas Day each season, with the exception of the inaugural season in 1990 (which featured a game on November 3, 1990 between the Los Angeles Lakers and the San Antonio Spurs), the 1997–98 season (which included a preseason tournament featuring the Chicago Bulls), the 1998–99 season (as no Christmas games were played due to the 1998–99 NBA lockout), and the final season of the network's contract in 2001–02 (which included two early season games featuring the return of Michael Jordan with the Washington Wizards). NBC aired the NBA All-Star Game every year (with the exception of 1999, when the game was canceled due to the lockout), usually at 6:00 p.m., Eastern Time. In 2002, NBC aired the game an hour earlier (at 5:00 p.m., Eastern) due to the Winter Olympics later that evening. Starting in 2000, during the NBA Playoffs, NBC would air tripleheaders on Saturdays and Sundays during the first two weeks of the playoffs. Prior to 2000, NBC would air a doubleheader on Saturday, followed by a tripleheader on Sunday.

On December 30, 2000, NBC aired a rare second December game. The Saturday match was the only time that NBC aired a game between Christmas Day and the start of the regular run of games in February. In 2001, NBC was scheduled to air an October preseason game involving an NBA team playing an international team; that game was canceled due to the September 11 attacks. During the 2001–02 NBA season, NBC added a significant number of Washington Wizards games to its schedule (due to the aforementioned return of Michael Jordan). When Jordan became injured during the middle of the season, the network replaced the added Wizards games with the games that had been originally on the schedule (for example, a March 2002 game between the Wizards and Orlando Magic was replaced at the last minute with an Indiana Pacers–Sacramento Kings game).

Segments

The pre-game show for NBC's NBA telecasts was NBA Showtime, a title that was used from 1990 until 2000, with the pre-game being unbranded afterward. Showtime was originally hosted by Bob Costas from the inaugural season of the 1990 contract to the 1995–96 season; Hannah Storm took over as host beginning with the 1996–97 season, who in turn was replaced by Ahmad Rashad in 2001 when Storm went on maternity leave. The video game NBA Showtime: NBA on NBC, by Midway Games, was named after the pregame show.

During the NBA Finals, additional coverage would be immediately available on CNBC, in which the panelists provided an additional half-hour of in-depth game discussions, after the NBC broadcast network's coverage concluded.

The halftime show was sponsored by Prudential Financial (Prudential Halftime Report), and later NetZero (NetZero at the Half) and Verizon Wireless (Verizon Wireless at the Half). The broadcasts also featured a segment during the live games called Miller Genuine Moments, which provided a brief retrospective on a particular historically significant and/or dramatic moment in NBA history; this segment was discontinued towards the end of NBC's coverage. The song used as the soundtrack for the Miller Genuine Moments segment was "Black Hole" by John Tesh. For a brief period in 2001–02, NBC aired a studio segment called 24, in which each analyst (at that time, Pat Croce, Jayson Williams or Mike Fratello) would have 24 seconds to talk about issues concerning the NBA. NBC (in conjunction with completely revamping the pregame show) discontinued the segment in February 2002, after Williams was arrested on murder charges.

Ratings

During its twelve-year run, the NBA on NBC experienced ratings highs and lows for the NBA. In the 1990s, the NBA Finals ratings were stellar, with the exception of 1999 Finals. In 1998, the NBA set a Finals ratings record, with an 18.7 household rating for the second Chicago Bulls–Utah Jazz series, the last championship run by the Michael Jordan-led Bulls. The very next year (after a lockout which erased part of the season), the ratings for the 1999 Finals plummeted, marking the beginning of an ongoing period of lower viewership for the league's game telecasts. In 2002, NBC set a record for the highest-rated Western Conference Final, including a 14.2 rating for Game 7 of the series between the Los Angeles Lakers and Sacramento Kings.

NBC's highest-rated regular season game was Michael Jordan's first game back from playing minor league baseball; the March 1995 game between the Chicago Bulls and Indiana Pacers scored a 10.9 rating (higher than all but three NBA telecasts on ABC). As a comparison, the first game in Jordan's second comeback (a game against the New York Knicks that aired on TBS opposite the 2001 World Series) scored a rating between a 3.0 and 4.0. NBC's first game of Jordan's second comeback scored ratings similar to that number.

Criticisms

Several NBA observers accused NBC and the NBA of being biased with only certain teams and individual players. NBC benefited from having all of the Finals it televised involve the large-market Chicago Bulls, Los Angeles Lakers, New York Knicks, New Jersey Nets, Philadelphia 76ers or Houston Rockets; however, smaller-market teams such as those in San Antonio, Sacramento, Phoenix, Seattle, Portland, Salt Lake City, Indianapolis, Orlando, and Miami all made regular appearances on NBC games during its run.

The first end of The NBA on NBC

Upon the expiration of NBC Sports' contract with the NBA in 2002, the league signed a broadcast television rights agreement with ABC, which began airing games in the 2002–03 season. NBC had made a four-year, US$1.3 billion bid in the spring of 2002 to renew its NBA rights, but the league instead made the initial six-year deals worth $4 billion with ESPN, ABC, and TNT.

The new media deal at the time highly incentivized airing games on cable television. The major leagues received more money from cable than broadcast, due to the dual revenue stream of subscriptions and ad revenue. NBC could not compete with the combined broadcast and cable deal that Disney had with ESPN and ABC. When NBC's relationship with the NBA ended, their only cable properties then were CNBC and MSNBC. Whereas NBC normally televised 33 regular season games per year, ABC would generally air fewer than 20 regular season games annually. According to NBA Commissioner David Stern, the reduced number of network telecasts was at the league's own request since the NBA believed that they would get a higher audience for a single game (in contrast to NBC's tripleheaders). The NBA saw its NBC ratings for the regular season fall from 4.3 in 1999 to 3.0 in 2000. Meanwhile, the playoff ratings dipped from 6.5 to 4.9.

As well as that, NBC began to lose money on the NBA after signing a new media deal in 1998. NBC lost $100 million on the NBA in the 2000–01 season. By December 2001, NBC was projecting a $200-million loss on the 2001–02 season. Additionally, NBC lost $35 million because of the failure of the XFL the previous year. As Charles Barkley summed it up during halftime of Game 1 of the 2002 NBA Finals "If y'all hadn't wasted all that money on the XFL, y'all would still have basketball."

In response to the impending loss of NBA coverage, NBC Entertainment president Jeff Zucker said:

We lost football two years ago, and we stayed a strong No. 1. We lost baseball, and we stayed a strong No. 1. Now we're about to lose basketball, and I believe we'll stay a strong No. 1. The fact is, it's had no impact on our prime time strength. . . NBC can now program all of Sunday nights without going around basketball. I think that's a huge advantage for us. We haven't been able for the last several years to put a program at 8 o'clock (such as American Dreams) because we've had the NBA.

NBC Sports chairman Dick Ebersol said:

The definition of winning has become distorted. If winning the rights to a property brings with it hundreds of millions of dollars in losses, what have you won? When faced with the prospect of heavy financial losses, we have consistently walked away and have done so again. ... We wish the NBA all the best. We have really enjoyed working with them for more than a decade to build the NBA brand.

Ebersol added:

We walked away from the N.F.L., because it was the right thing to do, and we stayed No. 1 in prime-time in all the important aspects. We walked away from baseball because it was the right thing to do and we don't have to take off our fall shows to show playoff games. The N.B.A. was asking us to lose hundreds of millions of dollars.

NBC network president Randy Falco said:

We have a responsibility to our shareholders.

NBC's last NBA telecast to date was Game 4 of the 2002 NBA Finals, which closed with highlights from the network's 12-year run with the league, through the Chicago Bulls' dynasty led by Michael Jordan and Scottie Pippen, the retirement of Larry Bird and Magic Johnson and the Los Angeles Lakers' new Shaq/Kobe reign. The final image of the end montage was set in an empty gym, showing a basketball bouncing into the background and ending with the message, "Thanks for The Memories" and a final appearance of the NBA on NBC logo on the bottom. Prior to the sequence, match commentators Marv Albert, Steve Jones and Bill Walton evaluated the end of their NBA contract and of the series. After that, Bob Costas closed the network's last NBA broadcast with the following:

Okay, Marv, thanks very much. And as Marv himself would say, "it should be pointed out" that Marv is celebrating his forty-ninth birthday tonight for a record twelfth consecutive year. Well, another season is in the books. The Lakers' title run continues with perhaps no end in sight. But as Marv said, we have reached the end of our run with the NBA. NBC's twelve years televising the league had been filled with indelible moments. And so, as we say good night, here's an appreciative look back. And for one last time, you've been watching the NBA on NBC.

Aftermath

From 2002 to 2006, the NBA's ratings on broadcast television (ABC) dropped almost a full ratings point (from nearly a 3.0 average rating to just above a 2.0 rating). NBC averaged a 5.5 average rating during the 2002 NBA Playoffs. ABC averaged a 3.3 average rating for the 2005 NBA Playoffs.

Within two years of the network losing the NBA rights, NBC dropped to fourth place in the prime time television rankings for the first time in its history, which was also partly the result of a weaker prime time schedule, and would more or less remain there for almost nine years.

Third iteration (2025–)

On July 23, 2024, NBC parent company Comcast confirmed in a conference call with its investors that NBC Sports had secured an agreement with the NBA on an 11-year media rights deal beginning in the 2025–26 season, marking the league's return to NBC after a 23 year absence. The agreement, which is valued at $2.5 billion per season, will see games broadcast on NBC and streaming on Peacock; NBC will broadcast regular season games on Tuesday nights throughout the season, and a package of Sunday night games following the conclusion of the NFL season and Sunday Night Football. Peacock will stream exclusive Monday night games. NBC will also carry six conference finals (airing every even year beginning in 2026), first and second-round playoff games, the NBA All-Star Game and All-Star Weekend, and a doubleheader of MLK Day games. Peacock will also stream some exclusive playoff games. The deal was officially announced by the NBA and NBC the following day, alongside deals with incumbents ESPN/ABC and newcomer Amazon.

Announcers

• Alex Neekilappappy

Music

The theme music for the NBA on NBC broadcasts is "Roundball Rock", composed by new-age artist John Tesh. The instrumental piece, first composed in 1990 for NBC, soundtracked the network's NBA coverage from 1990 to 2002 and will do so again starting in 2025. During periods when NBC hasn't broadcast the NBA, it has used the theme for its Olympic basketball coverage, first in 2008 and then in every Summer Olympics since 2016.

During NBC's NBA coverage from 1990 to 2002, the network would soundtrack their end-of-season montages to various songs. In 1991, "The Dream is Still Alive" by Wilson Phillips was played during the end-of-season montage. Afterwards, until 1996, NBC would play the rock song "Winning It All" by The Outfield during its end-of-season montage. From 1997 to 2001, several contemporary music pieces were used for the montage (including, in 1997, R. Kelly's song "I Believe I Can Fly", which coincidentally came from a basketball film – Space Jam, which starred Michael Jordan, in 1998, John Williams's song Exsultate Justi, and Pat Benatar's song "All Fired Up" from 1999 to 2001). After the 1999 Finals, NBC used "Fly Away" by Lenny Kravitz for their montage. For NBC's final broadcast in 2002, the network aired a montage of memorable moments from every year of coverage, using music from "Titans Spirit" (from the film Remember the Titans) to "Winning It All" and most notably, "To The Flemish Cap" from the 2000 film The Perfect Storm. The song composed by James Horner is played at the beginning of the montage as well as the end featuring footage from the Los Angeles Lakers dynasty era.

NBA coverage on other NBC-owned outlets

Telemundo Deportes

Following NBC's $2.7 billion purchase of Telemundo Communications Group from Sony Pictures and Liberty Media on October 11, 2001, Deportes Telemundo began to gradually be integrated into NBC Sports, although it would maintain sports programming rights separate from the main NBC broadcast network and its sister cable channels. Under NBC (which ironically lost the rights to the league that year to ABC), on August 20, 2002, Telemundo signed a three-year agreement with the NBA for the Spanish language broadcast rights to 15 NBA and up to ten WNBA regular season games; Telemundo and the NBA did not renew the deal upon its expiration following the 2004–05 season.

Beginning in 2025, Telemundo will return to airing select NBA games as a part of NBC's latest 11-year media rights agreement.

NBC Sports Regional Networks

Since 2011, NBCUniversal owns and operates a group of regional sports networks under the branding NBC Sports Regional Networks (formerly known as Comcast SportsNet). This includes five networks who currently hold local TV broadcast rights with individual NBA teams: NBC Sports Bay Area (Golden State Warriors), NBC Sports Boston (Boston Celtics), NBC Sports California (Sacramento Kings), NBC Sports Chicago (Chicago Bulls), NBC Sports Toronto (Toronto Raptors), NBC Sports Edmonton (Edmonton Kings), and NBC Sports Philadelphia (Philadelphia 76ers).