Why is Clemson football playing on The CW? Explaining new TV channel for Tigers game

During its recent run of College Football Playoffs and national championships, the Clemson football team has gotten used to playing on big-time TV channels.

So forgive coach Dabo Swinney for not being completely aware of The CW Network, the new conference television partner that’s carrying his Tigers’ game Saturday.

“I have no idea what it is,” Swinney said Tuesday. “I don’t even know where it’s at. Where do I go to it? … Where is it on the guide? I’ve got DIRECTV.”

Channel 62 for the Clemson area, he was told.

“So that’s where it’s at? 62? All right. … Yeah, I don’t watch a lot of TV, honestly.”

It’s not like he or anyone else in Upstate South Carolina has had any reason to know of or tune into non-traditional TV channels for Clemson football. It’s been seven years since Clemson played a football game on anything other than a major sports network such as ESPN/ABC or one of its affiliates such as ACC Network.

But with the Tigers stumbling out of the gates to a 4-3 record and 2-3 ACC record — their first time losing three-plus conference games since 2010 — the executives responsible for setting weekly game times and TV channels are pumping the brakes a bit when it comes to showcasing Clemson.

Case in point: This week’s game at N.C. State in Raleigh.

Clemson is appearing on a regional sports network, better known as an RSN, for the first time since a Sept. 10, 2016 home non-conference game against Troy, according to a review of past seasons’ game notes.

That’s a streak of over seven years and 105 games, with two CFP national championship game wins and dozens of ABC and ESPN placements and night games in between.

After a double overtime loss at Miami last weekend, though, Clemson — which was on a six-day hold for its Saturday game time — got assigned to a less-prestigious TV placement than usual.

No. 4 Florida State will play Wake Forest at noon on ABC. No. 20 Duke visits Louisville at 3:30 p.m. on ESPN. Virginia and Miami (3:30 p.m.) and No. 17 UNC and Georgia Tech (8 p.m.) are scheduled to meet on the ACC Network, an ESPN product that’s been around four years.

As for Clemson and N.C. State? They’ll be kicking off around 2 p.m. on The CW Network, a channel better known for running dramas such as “One Tree Hill” and “Gossip Girl” that just got into the sports broadcasting game and took some flak last week from cutting from an emotional postgame interview with Virginia’s Tony Elliott to a re-run episode of “Last Man Standing.”

How did Clemson get assigned to The CW?

The CW Network, based in the Los Angeles metro area, announced July 13 it had secured “exclusive broadcast rights” to 50 combined ACC football and men’s/women’s basketball games annually through 2026-27.

That new deal includes 13 football broadcasts for The CW annually, with Raycom Sports — a longtime ACC television partner — producing all of the games.

Make no mistake about it: A deal with The CW is a win for the ACC from an access perspective. The conference’s previous home for regional sport network broadcasts was Bally Sports, a perennially difficult channel to track down and one very prone to inopportune blackouts. Bally’s parent company filed for bankruptcy in March.

The CW, on the contrary, reaches 100% of U.S. television households via antenna, per a network release, no different than your ABCs or ESPNs or NBCs. It’s also available via streaming services such as YouTube TV and Hulu in most but not all markets.

But it’s not a top-tier option for ACC football games.

ESPN, the ACC’s primary television partner, pays millions of dollars for the right to set weekly kickoff times and TV channels for league football games. The ESPN family of channels includes ESPN, ABC and ACC Network. The CW, in terms of priority, is below all three of those.

The network’s first ACC broadcast, a Pittsburgh-Cincinnati non-conference night game in Week 2, was an exciting get. Since then, though, The CW has been relegated to less-flashy games in the weekly TV assignments determined by partners.

• Week 3: NC State vs. VMI

• Week 4: Georgia Tech at Wake Forest

• Week 5: Virginia at Boston College

• Week 6: Marshall at N.C. State

• Week 7: No. 14 Louisville at Pitt

• Week 8: Virginia at No. 10 UNC

Given the unpredictable state of college football, a few of those games have ended up being awesome. N.C. State-Marshall was a shootout — 89 combined points! — and Louisville-Pitt and UNC-Virginia (especially the latter) were massive upsets of undefeated ranked teams by unranked opponents.

Still, general knowledge says a 7-0 Clemson team, or even a 5-2 Clemson team, wouldn’t be appearing on The CW and would be cruising into another ESPN, ABC or ACC Network game.

Among the teams that have appeared on The CW thus far, only Louisville and UNC sit in the top half of this week’s ACC football standings.

And both of those schools were big betting favorites in games assumed to be blowouts (Louisville minus-7 at Pitt, UNC minus-24 vs. Virginia).

The other teams with an appearance on The CW are currently tied for sixth (Boston College, Georgia Tech), tied for 9th (N.C. State, Virginia) and tied for 12th (Pitt, Wake Forest) among 14 teams. Clemson, at 2-3 in conference play, sits alone at No. 8 and is favored by 10 points Saturday at N.C. State (4-3, 1-2 ACC).

An ACC spokesperson confirmed to The State the league’s football teams aren’t contractually obligated to appear in, say, one game on The CW annually. (The SEC has this arrangement with its schools for games on SEC Network Plus, its streaming service, with schools required to play one game on the platform each season.)

The ACC spokesperson also confirmed that, in terms of weekly TV placements, The CW selects its games only after ESPN, the league’s primary TV partner, makes multiple selections for its various channels (ESPN, ABC, ACCN).

ACC Commissioner Jim Phillips, in a July release, said the conference was “thrilled” to be adding The CW to its weekly TV lineup and that its “national distribution will directly benefit our student-athletes, teams, alumni and fans.”

Reading between the lines, though, there’s a reason No. 4 Florida State probably won’t touch The CW’s airwaves this season and Clemson and N.C. State will.

How to watch Clemson on The CW

The easiest way to watch Saturday’s Clemson-N.C. State game is via cable.

If you have a traditional cable TV setup through DIRECTV, DISH Network, Spectrum or another provider, you can simply plug your ZIP code into The CW’s channel finder and find the game.

The game will also be available through the streaming apps for those providers, such as the DIRECTV app, but would require a subscriber log-in.

The CW is also generally available on popular cable-free streaming services such as YouTube TV, Hulu+ Live TV and fuboTV, per the News & Observer. That covers “most but not all markets,” according to The Athletic.

One prominent place you won’t find the game — the WatchESPN app or The CW app (which is free and doesn’t need a log-in). The digital rights for those games aren’t available on the app right now and are exclusive to TV broadcasting, according to the network president.