Television broadcasts of the National Basketball Association (NBA) games were first broadcast by American broadcast network ABC from January 3, 1965 to May 10, 1973. Broadcasts returned on December 25, 2002, this time utilizing the NBA on ABC branding. After the ABC Sports division was merged into ESPN by parent company Disney in 2006, the said branding was rarely used.
ABC's regular season schedule includes Christmas Day games; NBA Saturday Primetime games on selected weekends from December or January to March; and NBA Sunday Showcase games on selected afternoons from February to March. ABC then airs selected games during the first five weeks of the NBA playoffs and is the exclusive broadcaster of the NBA Finals.
History First ABC era (1965–1973) ABC first signed a deal with the NBA to become the league's primary television partner in 1964; ABC's first game telecast aired on January 3, 1965 (a game between the Boston Celtics and Cincinnati Royals).Source: ABC ad for NBA game in Chicago Tribune (January 3, 1965) ABC's initial alliance with the NBA first came about due to ABC Sports head Roone Arledge's search for live programming that could diminish the ratings of CBS Sports Spectacular, and ABC's anthology program, Wide World of Sports a boost with sponsors. ABC initially paid the NBA only $650,000 for the rights annually.
For much of the 1960s, ABC only televised Sunday afternoon games, including during the NBA Playoffs. This meant that ABC did not have to televise a potential NBA Finals deciding game if it were played on a weeknight. In 1969, ABC did televise Game 7 of the Los Angeles Lakers–Boston Celtics series in prime time on a weeknight. The following season, ABC aired the 1970 NBA Finals in its entirety, making it the first Finals series to have all games televised nationally.
Commentators for the original NBA on ABC included play-by-play announcers Keith Jackson and Chris Schenkel, and analysts Jack Twyman, Bob Cousy and Bill Russell. On April 8, 1967, a strike by the American Federation of Television and Radio Artists (AFTRA) forced ABC Sports producer Chuck Howard and director Chet Forte to call Game 4 of the Eastern Conference Finals between Boston Celtics and Philadelphia 76ers, as its regular announcing team were members of the union. Curt Gowdy also served on play-by-play for half of the 1967–68 season.
The first nationally televised Christmas Day NBA broadcast occurred in when ABC broadcast a game between the Los Angeles Lakers and San Diego Rockets from the then-San Diego Sports Arena in San Diego. Jerry Gross and Jack Twyman called that particular broadcast for the network. ABC would continue to televise Christmas games through . The remainder of these broadcasts were based on Arizona Veterans Memorial Coliseum in Phoenix. Chris Schenkel did play-by-play for ABC during this period except , when Keith Jackson held that responsibility. Jack Twyman remained as the color commentator for the broadcasts up until when the position was assumed by Bill Russell.
By 1969, ABC's NBA contract was worth only $3 million. To put things into proper perspective, in 1969, Major League Baseball's television contract with NBC was worth $16.5 million while the National Football League cost CBS about $22 million. ABC had made a bargain in purchasing the television rights to the NBA, considering the league's steady ratings. ABC's ratings for the NBA rose from a 6.0 in 1965 to an 8.2 in 1968.
ABC was by this time, coming increasingly under fire for what was perceived to be a less-than-spectacular presentation of the NBA. Sports Illustrateds Frank Deford in particular, singled ABC out for their coverage of the 1971 NBA Finals. Deford felt that ABC was making a mistake in trying to cover the NBA the same way that they covered a football game because they were two different games. On that end, Deford wrote that neither ABC's announcers nor cameras were able to isolate the important phases of the game. He added that replays were used only to second-guess officials rather than "capture the grace and precision of the performers". Meanwhile, Deford also criticized play-by-play man Chris Schenkel in regards to his failure to appreciate the nuances of the game and their halftime shows, which Deford saw as not innovative or imaginative.
The network proposed a contract extension with a modest rights bump in 1972, which was criticized by owners. Reportedly, a powerful bloc of owners in larger television markets were weary of television, though they understood they needed television to promote their brand. A major sticking point was attempting to force the prospective winning television network to air games on Saturdays during the fall and winter, directly in competition with far more popular college football telecasts on ABC. ABC balked at the request.
ABC lost the broadcast rights to the NBA to CBS after the 1972–73 season, with the network's initial tenure with the league ending with its last NBA Finals game on May 10, 1973. ABC filled the void left by losing the NBA by counterprogramming Wide World of Sports on Sundays against CBS' NBA coverage.
The dark years (1973–2002) On December 15, 1973, ABC aired what is considered to be the first telecast of a regular season college basketball game by a major broadcast network (between UCLA and North Carolina State in St. Louis). ABC televised this game using its former NBA announcing crew of Keith Jackson and Bill Russell.
Bill Russell also provided color commentary for ABC's coverage of basketball at the Summer Olympics in 1972 and 1976. Russell worked alongside Frank Gifford, Bill Flemming (who (filled in for Gifford while he did wrestling in 1972), and Curt Gowdy.
And then in the 1977–78 NCAA Division I men's season, C.D. Chesley (who controlled the rights to the Atlantic Coast Conference (ACC) at the time) wanted NBC to televise select ACC games as part of its national package as it had done the previous few years. However, NBC wanted to feature intersectional games. This action greatly upset Chesley, who wound up selling the rights to the ACC Tournament final to ABC. ABC would televise the 1978 ACC Tournament final as part of Wide World of Sports. The game, called by Jim Lampley and Bill Russell, marked the first time Duke University's Blue Devils basketball team played on national television.
For ABC's final Summer Olympics to date, which were the 1984 games from Los Angeles, Keith Jackson provided the play–by–play alongside Digger Phelps (men) and Ann Meyers (women).
ABC wouldn't begin broadcasting college basketball on a more regular basis until January 18, 1987. In the early years of ABC's regular college basketball coverage, Keith Jackson and Dick Vitale were the primary announcing crew, while Gary Bender was the secondary play-by-play announcer behind Jackson. Meanwhile, Al Michaels did regional games during this period.
Also beginning in 1987 and continuing through 1989, ABC broadcast the McDonald's Open. Gary Bender and Dick Vitale provided the commentary for ABC's broadcasts. Supplemental coverage was provided by TBS.
ABC Radio's coverage (1984–1990) From the 1984–85 through 1989–90 seasons, the ABC Radio Network was the official, national radio broadcaster of NBA games, succeeding the Mutual Broadcasting System. ABC Radio was in return, supplanted by Public Interest Affiliates' (or PIA's) NBA Radio Network.
Commentators included Fred Manfra on play-by-play and Oscar Robertson (from 1984 to 1985 through 1985–86), Dick Vitale (from 1986–87 through 1989–90) and Earl Monroe (from 1988–89 through 1989–90) on color commentary. Other announcers included Marv Albert (1989 All-Star Game) and Chick Hearn (1988 All-Star Game) on play-by-play and Rod Hundley (1987 and 1989 All-Star Games), Johnny Most (1988 All-Star Game), and Dave Barnett (1986 All-Star Game) on color commentary.
Current ABC/ESPN era (2002–present) On January 22, 2002, the NBA signed a six-year deal with The Walt Disney Company and Turner Sports, which renewed an existing deal with TNT and allowed ABC and ESPN to acquire the rights to air the NBA's games. ABC and ESPN reportedly paid an average of about US$400 million a season. Technically, ESPN pays the NBA for its broadcast rights and "buys" time on ABC to air select games (this is noted in copyright tags during the end credits after the telecasts, saying "The preceding program has been paid for by ESPN, Inc."). As part of the agreement, ABC acquired the rights to the NBA Finals, at least 5 other NBA Playoffs games, 15 regular season games (mostly on Sunday afternoons), and NBA Inside Stuff on Saturday mornings.
For the 2006–07 NBA season, ABC's sports operations were fully integrated into ESPN (rebranding the sports division as ESPN on ABC). In June 2007, the NBA renewed its television agreement with ESPN and ABC.
The agreement was renewed in January 2014, extending it through the 2024–25 NBA season. ABC expanded its coverage beginning in the 2015–16 season when ESPN announced that ABC would add a series of eight of Saturday night games to its slate of broadcasts. As a result of this change, ABC no longer aired regular Sunday doubleheaders; doubleheaders ultimately returned in 2022. Expansion continued in 2021 when ABC began airing coverage of the NBA draft. On October 2, 2023, it was announced that five Wednesday night games originally scheduled to air on ESPN in January 2024 would be moved to ABC, as part of replacement programming due to the WGA and SAG-AFTRA strikes.
The NBA officially renewed its agreement again with ESPN and ABC on July 24, 2024, for another 11 years, taking its coverage through to the 2035–36 season. As part of a separate sublicensing agreement with Disney and Warner Bros. Discovery, ESPN and ABC gained the broadcasting rights to TNT Sports' Inside the NBA beginning in the 2025–26 season, the first season of their renewed agreement. TNT Sports will continue to produce the show for ESPN and ABC.
Coverage
Overview ABC's NBA regular season coverage has typically begun with Christmas Day games, followed by NBA Saturday Primetime and NBA Sunday Showcase on selected weekends starting in mid-January and February, respectively. Sunday Showcase typically begins with a single game on Super Bowl Sunday, except in 2021 (due to the COVID-19 pandemic-altered schedule) and 2027 (due to ABC and ESPN's broadcast of Super Bowl LXI), and continues throughout selected weekends in March. In , and , ABC's schedule instead began with a Saturday Primetime game on the second Saturday in December. In and , ABC's NBA coverage began with the In-Season Tournament/NBA Cup, knockout rounds also during the second Saturday of December; such games have since been moved to Prime Video.
When ABC took over the broadcast television deal in , it continued NBC's tradition of televising doubleheaders on Christmas for the most part. However in and , ABC instead only aired one Christmas game. From to , ABC also insisted on carrying a Christmas game between the Miami Heat and the Los Angeles Lakers, featuring their respective players Shaquille O'Neal and Kobe Bryant. In , ABC's coverage began featuring a music video featuring Mariah Carey performing her hit 1994 single "All I Want for Christmas Is You." In , Carey was also featured singing "Oh Santa!" From to , ABC expanded to a tripleheader on Christmas Day. In all five Christmas Day games were simulcast across both ABC and ESPN, as an attempt to counterprogram the NFL's scheduling of Christmas Day Games across CBS, Fox, and NBC in 2022. With Christmas Day falling on a Monday in , only two of the five games were ABC and ESPN simulcasts; the early and two evening games were only on ESPN while ABC aired Monday Night Football. In , after the NFL scheduled Christmas Day games on a Wednesday for the first time, all five of the NBA's games were again simulcast across both ABC and ESPN.