UT; Host Communications to Offer Improved Live Web Audio Coverage of Vols

Aug. 29, 2003

Students, alumni and fans across the country will be able to support UT athletics in 2003 by listening to real-time coverage of the Tennessee Volunteers and coaches' shows on the Web. The University of Tennessee Athletics Department and Host Communications announced this week they have once again teamed with Yahoo! Sports to deliver real-time audio broadcasts throughout the 2003-04 school year.

By logging on to either utsports.com or Yahoo! Sports and selecting one of two subscription options, fans can access live Vol Network audio broadcasts of games, press conferences, coaches' shows and related athletic department events. Included in the package are Vol Radio Network broadcasts of Tennessee football, basketball, baseball and Lady Vols basketball games.

Vol Radio Network call-in shows "Vol Calls" and "Lady Vol Illustrated" also will be available to fans. In addition, a portion of the revenue from each subscription goes directly to each school's athletics department, so fans will be supporting UT athletics financially as well.

The Yahoo! Sports audio offerings are available for both broadband and dial-up users and enable fans to listen to the Vol Radio Network broadcasts of UT athletics. As a result, alumni that live thousands of miles from their alma mater will be able to follow every game as if they were located in the state of Tennessee. This year, Yahoo! Sports will be providing fans with higher-quality audio streaming and more content from participating schools.

"It became apparent this new service was the next step to take in order to improve and enhance the service for University of Tennessee fans and to cover the requirements of providing the technical infrastructure and support for these services," said Edwin Huster, general manager of Host Communications/Vol Network. "It follows the trend of what Major League Baseball, the NFL and other professional leagues and college teams have done over the past few years to improve and enhance audio streaming quality and program content regarding Internet broadcasts."

All schools making audio content available via Yahoo! Sports in 2003 -- including the University of Tennessee -- will offer the following subscription packages:

1. School Pass Subscription -- Users can access all broadcasts for UT athletics on a monthly or annual basis. For example, users can pay $4.95 per month or $29.95 per year to gain access to all streamed sports broadcast by the Vol Network

2. College Pack Subscription -- Each school will be integrated into and offered as part of the College Pack subscription for $9.95/month or $59.95/year. This package allows users to access all college broadcasts for all schools.

In addition to Tennessee, a partial list of the featured schools in Yahoo! Sports' College Pack includes: Alabama, Arizona State, Duke, Kansas, Indiana, Iowa, Michigan, North Carolina State, Oklahoma, Oregon State, Purdue, Pittsburgh, Virginia Tech and Washington State.

"Fans are the University of Tennessee's biggest asset," Huster said. "We hope UT fans will embrace this new and improved service and continue to follow the Vols worldwide on the Internet."

The content for both subscription packages went live on Aug. 21.