ATLANTA—The Ohio Valley Conference has renewed its deal with Gray Media to broadcast the league’s athletic events across twenty Gray markets in eight states.

As part of the Conference’s multi-year contract with ESPN, the entire package will also be simulcast live nationally on ESPN+ and available through the ESPN app without digital blackouts.

The 2026-27 package again features select men’s and women’s basketball matchups, plus expanded coverage with three men’s soccer, three women’s soccer and four volleyball contests this fall. A list of basketball contests to broadcast on Gray stations will be announced at a later date, in addition to plans for spring sports coverage.

Gray’s Tennessee Valley Sports & Entertainment Network and Mid-South Sports & Entertainment Network each looks forward to bringing two Tennessee institutions – Tennessee State University and the University of Tennessee at Martin – to viewers across the state.

The Tennessee Valley Sports & Entertainment Network broadcasts over-the-air in Nashville, Knoxville, and Chattanooga, while the Mid-South Sports & Entertainment Network broadcasts in Memphis and Jackson. The OVC is headquartered in Brentwood, Tennessee (just south of Nashville).

In addition, Gray’s Matrix Midwest in St. Louis and Cape Girardeau, Missouri, will serve hometown viewers of OVC’s Southeast Missouri State University, Southern Illinois University Edwardsville and Lindenwood University, while Gray’s Illinois stations in Champaign, Peoria, Quincy, and Rockford are excited to serve fans of OVC’s Western Illinois University and Eastern Illinois University.

Gray’s Indiana stations in Evansville, Ft. Wayne, South Bend, Lafayette and Terre Haute will focus on the University of Southern Indiana, and Gray will also bring the package to fans of Morehead State University in Lexington, Kentucky.

WOODBURY, N.Y.—Southeast Missouri State University has upgraded its cameras to stream Ohio Valley Conference (OVC) sports and other TV productions with the purchase of four Hitachi Z-HD5000 cameras.

The cameras, deployed by the university’s Mass Media’s TV and Film program –a department of the Holland College of Arts and Media, will be used for studio and remote video acquisition.

Students in the department produce content that’s broadcast as SETV on the local CBS/CW and Fox affiliates. They also work as crew members to produce and stream more than 100 OVC sporting events annually involving the Southeast Missouri Redhawks every year on ESPN+.

“When the OVC made it a requirement to stream sporting events, each school received a production pack with starter-level equipment including cameras,” explained Dr. Jim Dufek, professor, operations manager and SETV director in the department of Mass Media at Southeast Missouri State University. “After running into a variety of problems and limitations with it, we elected to purchase our own equipment that we could use for the Mass Media program as well as OVC sports coverage.”

Working with St. Louis-based reseller Modern Communications, the university selected the Hitachi cameras “based on their quality, affordability and reputation,” said Dufek. The cameras match the local CBS affiliate’s studio cameras, which allows the university to produce programs with the same quality as the broadcaster and to give students experience to make an easy transition to the station, he added.

The cameras are mounted on Vinten pedestals in the studio and Libec tripods in the field. They are used with Marshall monitors and a NewTek TriCaster production switcher and graphics system.

More information is available on the Hitachi website.