Channel 50 has prep football, with even bigger play to come

The Illinois High School Association football playoffs are back on WPWR Channel 50, but it's yet to be determined if they're serving a purpose on the station.

This makes the third year Channel 50 has aired them, starting with the Class 8A semifinal between Naperville North and Homewood Flossmoor at 7 p.m. today, followed by the 6A semi between Lemont and Oak Forest at 7 p.m. Saturday.

Then Channel 50 will run all eight class championship games from Champaign next Friday and Saturday, four apiece starting at 10 a.m. each day.

It's great that Channel 50 scooped them up, seizing the IHSA football package from public WYCC Channel 20, and it needed the programming, especially after it lost the United Paramount Network last year. American telenovelas didn't exactly fill the vacuum in prime time, and neither have "Decision House" and tawdry specials on the likes of Britney Spears and Anna Nicole Smith.

Yet, well-intentioned as it is to air the IHSA playoffs, they only bring so many new viewers to the station, and those viewers are quick to leave. Still, the station is desperate enough to look for any additional eyeballs.

That's been the inspiration behind its foxhilities.com Web site as well. Foxhilites is co-sponsored by the IHSA and is also aligned with Channel 50's Fox-owned sibling station, WFLD Channel 32. The site will stream all these playoffs games live, and it also tries to attract traffic by allowing students and others to post their own videos there (although nothing like the Glenbard North-Fremd videos found on YouTube).

The common belief in the media now is that you want to get any sort of churn going, both in more conventional areas like broadcast TV and in the new media of the Internet and Web sites. But does this translate into actual additional viewers in the local Nielsen ratings? Publicity never hurts, but I don't think all that many Naperville North fans will be hanging around to watch "Rocky III" after tonight's game -- although there's no doubt it will attract more viewers than it would have otherwise.

Now, if Channel 50 were to attract a real marquee sports franchise to the station, that would be a different matter. And guess what? It just so happens when the Bears play at Washington on Thursday, Dec. 6 on the NFL Network, the game will be simulcast locally on Channel 50.

Unlike TBS, which played hardball in October's baseball playoffs, the NFL Network doesn't have the clout to maintain exclusivity. Besides, the NFL has a longstanding tradition of allowing cable games to be broadcast locally for the teams involved to gain the widest possible audience -- not just cable and satellite subscribers, but anyone with a TV.

Whether or not the Bears are still in playoff contention, whether Rex Grossman, Brian Griese or even Kyle Orton is quarterbacking the team at that point, look for the game to set a ratings record for Channel 50.

But will it entice Bears fans to watch "Decision House?" That remains to be seen.