Media Credentials: Inside Sports Media

WHITE PLAINS, New York (Ticker) -- A longtime staple of the USA Network, the U.S. Open will be carried by ESPN and the Tennis Channel beginning next year. The United States Tennis Association and the pair of cable networks announced a six-year partnership on Monday. USA Network, the primary cable television station for the event since 1984, will televise the Grand Slam for the last time this summer. CBS retains the broadcast network rights via its contract through 2011 with the USTA.

"This completes a five-year process of reinventing the television and digital landscape for the sport of tennis in North America," USTA CEO Arlen Kantarian said. "Tennis will now be prominently featured for eight straight weeks." ESPN2 will become the lead cable broadcaster for the U.S. Open and the U.S. Open Series in 2009, airing nearly 200 hours of tennis coverage during the eight-week North American summer tennis season.

Tennis Channel will continue as a U.S. Open Series broadcaster, but will now also broadcast more than 60 hours of live U.S. Open coverage. CBS Sports will continue to broadcast nearly 40 hours of live coverage of the fourth Grand Slam of the year. The two-week U.S. Open is annually played during the last week of August into early September in Queens, New York at Flushing Meadows.