AHSAA, PlayOn! Sports Sign 6-Year Digital Agreement
The Alabama High School Athletic Association (AHSAA) has entered into an agreement with PlayOn! Sports giving the Atlanta-based high school sports media company digital rights for AHSAA post-season events for the next six years.
The agreement, which was developed for the AHSAA by The Alabama Sports Foundation (ASF), begins immediately and will run through 2019. It encompasses statewide internet streaming for all the AHSAA’s post-season playoffs as well as other special events. PlayOn! Sports will also manage a special on-demand archived network, which will be available to the public 24 hours a day.
Also, PlayOn! is offering all AHSAA member schools an education-based software platform that will allow each school to web-stream its own events. Twenty AHSAA member schools are already using the PlayOn! Platform to stream events.
PlayOn! has been an AHSAA contributing partner since 2010.
“I am very excited. This partnership with PlayOn! Sports will no doubt solidify internet coverage for our AHSAA member schools for many years to come and will help move the AHSAA into the future on firm ground,” said AHSAA Executive Director Steve Savarese.
“This long-term commitment by PlayOn!, the AHSAA and its Central Board of Control will not only produce a quality internet live-stream and archived video package for our many events, but also will also expand our internet presence worldwide for future championship events.”
David Rudolph, CEO of PlayOn! Sports, shares Savarese’s enthusiasm.
“All of us at PlayOn! are extremely excited about furthering our partnership with the Alabama High School Athletic Association. We have been working with high schools in Alabama for three years,” said Rudolph. "We strive to provide our viewers the best digital sports experience possible. Joining forces with the AHSAA means we’ve added another level of quality post-season and state championship sports programming to our already robust portfolio.”
PlayOn! Sports, as the nation’s premier high school sports media company, is the largest rights holder, producer, and aggregator of high school sports events distributed across television, the Internet, and mobile devices and already partners with 26 state associations across the U.S., from California to Connecticut and from Wisconsin to Florida.
The agreement begins immediately with the live-streaming of the Indoor Track Championships and State Wrestling Championships in February.
“Our goal has always been to make live-streaming coverage of our championship events available to everyone, and this will now make that goal possible,” Savarese added. “PlayOn! Sports provides a quality sports product, and we know it will be a first-class production. This is such good news for our schools and our children, especially the PlayOn! educational component. We appreciate the hard work of the Alabama Sports Foundation in securing this agreement for the AHSAA.”
By combining AHSAA post-season content with the regular-season events of member schools, PlayOn! Sports provides a unique multi-media platform to broadcast high school sports to the schools, families and fans that love them. The new Internet video portal for the AHSAA Network, http://www.playonsports.com/channels/alabama , hosts all events produced through the partnership. Events will be streamed live and will be archived for on demand viewing.