2018 MAAC Swimming & Diving Championships Program

2018 MAAC Swimming & Diving Championships

THE DISNEY MAAC STORY

The MAAC will support 24 sports and championships during the 2016-17 academic year, which almost all have NCAA Cham- pionship Access through automatic bids or regional qualifying systems. Highlighting the MAAC’s commitment to providing a first rate experience for its fans and student-athletes are those championships held at the Walt Disney World Resort ESPN Wide World of Sports. The 2016-17 academic year represents the MAAC’s 18th year of hosting championships at the complex where the league hosts 3 events each year. These include one fall champion- ship each year with all 11 member schools participating. The sports that rotate include men’s soccer, men’s & women’s cross country, women’s soccer, and volleyball. In the fall of 2016, cross country will return to the complex for its championship. The championship operation at Disney allows the MAAC to pro- vide its participating student-athletes and their families and fans a world-class sports championship experience. The access to the playing facilities, on-site hotels, theme parks, including an after-hours awards banquet, are designed to provide lasting memories for the student-athletes.

The MAAC and ESPN have an agreement with Disney through the 2018 season, which includes ESPN live broadcasting ele- ments for all the championships. ESPN’s state-of-the-art studios broadcast highlights of MAAC on-site tournaments through- out all Disney World Resort hotel properties as well as on ESPN3 and MAAC.TV. All MAAC contests for Volleyball, Men’s and Women’s Soccer, Men’s and Women’s Cross Country, and Men’s and Women’s Golf are broadcast by ESPN’s on-site studios. This year’s men’s and women’s cross country will have both races broadcasted live on ESPN3 to a national audience available for viewing in 86 million homes on high speed internet networks. The men are scheduled to race on Saturday October 29th at 8:00am and the women are schedule to race at 9:00am. The MAAC has also co-hosted with ESPN since 2006 the Advocare Invitational (previously the Old Spice Classic) at the ES- PNWWS complex. This 8-team tournament is held over Thanksgiving weekend continues to draw elite men’s basketball teams to compete. One MAAC school is included in the field each year and this Thanksgiving Quinnipiac University will compete in this premier event. The MAAC also hosts its Men’s & Women’s Golf Championships at the Disney complex. The men’s and women’s golf teams compete at PGA-caliber courses during the spring and rotate between Palm and Magnolia (2017) at the Arnold Palmer man- aged courses. The golf hosting agreement at Disney was recently extended through 2018 championships. As noted before, ESPN studios in Orlando is an important element of MAAC broadcasting efforts. It also serves as the pro- duction site for the annual MAAC Pre-Season Coaches Show and develops in-season features, commercials and promotional elements for the MAAC ESPN broadcasts and for MAAC.TV. During the 2012-13 season, both the Cross Country and Golf Championships saw live coverage on ESPN3 for the first time in MAAC history because of the valuable partnership between the MAAC and the Walt Disney World Resort. In lieu of the annual MAAC SAAC forum where student-athlete leaders from all MAAC schools participate in a live issues forum on ESPN3, two MAAC SAAC commercials will be produced in the ESPN studios to be used during 2017-18 MAAC produced school produced broadcasts.

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