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Show ! ESPN acquires rights to NCAA Championships for 1982-84 seasons ESPN has acquired the rights to televise 13 men's and nine women's NCAA championships each of j the next two seasons, including 24 games each year from the prestigious National Collegiate Basketball Championship and exclusive ex-clusive national coverage cover-age of the College t World Series, it was J announced today by Scotty Connal, EXPN executive vice-president vice-president and chief i: operating officer, and Seaver Peters, chair, i NCAA General Tele-J Tele-J vision Committee. The 1982-83 season I will be the fourth consecutive conse-cutive year that the j NCAA and ESPN have entered into a relationship relation-ship to present fall, I winter and spring ' championships in all three divisions. The 24 games from , the National. Collegiate Basketball Champion- I ship will be comprised I of the newly-created I pre-tournament elimin-! elimin-! ation round (all four games), 14 games from i the first round, and six j regional semifinals. As has been the case in the Past, ESPN will present pre-sent these games in association with NCAA Productions. Coverage of all games from the College World Series, most of them live, is also planned. Other men's championships to be aired will be Division I soccer, indoor track, hockey, tennis and " lacrosse; Division II wrestling, track, swimming, gymnastics and basketball; and Division III basketball. "The NCAA Champ ionships package, led by men's Division I basketball and, more recently, the College World Series, has been one of the most popular programming entities we've presented," said Robert M. Gutkowski, ESPN vice-president, programming. "We firmly believe athletes competing at all NCAA levels deserve national recognition, and we are extremely pleased to join again with the NCAA to present top quality championship competition." Thomas W. Jernstedt, NCAA assistant assi-stant executive director, said: "The NCAA has been pleased with ESPN's past coverage of NCAA Championships, and looks forward to achieving achiev-ing additional visibility for its championship program and the participating part-icipating student-athlete student-athlete with the new agreement." As part of the package, ESPN will also present comprehensive compre-hensive features " on three additional NCAA championships - men's Division I golf and Division III wrestling and women's Division III volleyball - on "SportsCenter," the network's sports news show which airs seven times daily. NCAA Championship Champion-ship on ESPN in 1982-83 and 1983-84: Men's Championships Div. I - Basketball, Soccer, Indoor Track, Hockey, Tennis, Baseball, Base-ball, Lacrosse. Div.II - Wrestling, Track, Swimming, Gymnastics, Basketball. Basket-ball. Div. Ill - Basketball Tentative for 1983. Women's Championships Cham-pionships Div. I - Tennis, Field Hockey, Volleyball, Softball. Div. II - Basketball, Basket-ball, Gymnastics, Swimming, Track. Div. Ill -- Basketball |