Mediacom's Big Ten Network launch includes northwest Iowa

Viewers from the Iowa Great Lakes to Spencer and from Emmetsburg to Estherville will have a chance to see the Iowa State-Iowa football game after all.

Mediacom Communications on Thursday announced that customers in 15 northwest Iowa counties will be able to see Saturday's intrastate football game on Mediacom, and that the company is moving forward on its next phase of a channel launch that will permanently place the Big Ten Network on its family cable line-up.

"By moving quickly into this next phase of adding the collegiate sports channel, the Big Ten Network will be available to Mediacom customers in all of the approximately 300 Iowa communities in which Mediacom provides video and broadband services," a statement from Mediacom communications director Phyllis Peters said.

Mediacom's senior vice president, Ed Pardini, said that customers in northwest Iowa can expect the BTN to arrive on its permanent channel location on or before Oct. 15. In the meantime, Pardini gave assurances that any Iowa games to be broadcast on the Big Ten Network will be carried on the Mediacom Connections Channel.

The broadcasts on channel 22 are an interim measure Mediacom is making available during the period in which channel moves and required notification steps are made.

Spencer Municipal Utilities cable subscribers can see the Iowa State-Iowa game and other Big Ten Network programming on channel 31.

Iowa counties included in this next phase of Mediacom's Big Ten Network channel launch are: Clay, Dickinson, Buena Vista, Calhoun, Cherokee, Emmet, Hamilton, Humboldt, Kossuth, Palo Alto, Pocahontas, Sac, Webster, Winnebago and Wright.