It was a landmark even in the big bucks world of American sports. Last week, soft drinks giant Coca-Cola tied up with a newly launched company called College Sports Television (CSTV).
The deal is believed to be worth $15 million, including a $10 million equity stake and $5 million for marketing and promotional activities like advertising, special events and other such initiatives.
Coke is already a giant player in the collegiate sporting arena. A few months ago, Coca-Cola had announced an 11-year sponsorship of the NCAA (National Collegiate Amateur Association) and its 87 National Championship events.
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According to initial information, CSTV plans in-depth sports coverage of about 1,200-odd universities and colleges across the US and at all levels.
Coca-Cola has always had a strong presence in college sport, primarily the NCAA. So the new partnership is a logical extension.
In US, college sport is big. As each season ends, the focus shifts to the college players, who are likely to get into NBA or World Series Baseball.
Athletics and tennis have been the other big sports, and of late football, volleyball and many other such events have begun attracting big money.
The proposed CSTV, apart from showcasing live coverage of NCAA events, is also planning programming to focus on features, players, the sporting community and fans.
In the past Coca-Cola has always focused on events rather than personalities, unlike its rival Pepsi. Coca-Cola has been involved with the Olympic Games and it is even said that Atlanta won the bid for the 1996 Games partly because Coke is headquartered in the city.
It is only in India that the company has relied a lot on celebrities for their campaigns. Elsewhere it has always supported events, whether sporting or entertainment.
NOW SHIFT your attention to India. Time was when sports organisers would go on bended knee and plead with Doordarshan officials to cover their events.
That happened frequently even for major national events and sometimes even internationals. Local events and college sports stood no chance of getting on air.
The arrival of sports channels like ESPN, Star and of late TEN Sports has meant sports at different levels do have some hope. But local and college sports are still a long way from getting their due.
The fact, that college sport is the nursery where future champions are gleaned, is lost on Doordarshan. But other channels are no different. All sports channels beaming into India survive on cricket.
Little wonder then Sony forked out astronomical sums to get the rights to the 2003 Cricket World Cup and during those six weeks virtually shut out every other channel.
Mandira Bedi and Charu Sharma, who are hardly comparable to Harsha Bhogle and Sunil Gavaskar, hogged all the limelight, while the latter were left to pontificate without access to any footage.
Old-timers will recall that inter-college sport in India was once big. Time was when Sunil Gavaskar played for Bombay University and scored a triple century, and P T Usha ran for Calicut University.
The inter-university cricket championships for the Rohinton Baria Cup was a much-awaited event; and the inter-university athletics and hockey meets saw stars who wore India colours at Asian and Olympic games.
But sadly, there was no television coverage in those days. It was black-and-white TV and coverage meant slavishly following the prime minister and president