Jake Nutting 
While the Tampa Bay Rowdies home debut this Saturday will be closed to the general public, fans will have a new way to catch the matchup with Atlanta United 2.
The Rowdies announced Wednesday that the match will be broadcast live on FOX Sports Sun and will be available digitally on FOX Sports Go. ESPN+ will also stream the match, which is set for kick off at 7:30 p.m at Al Lang.
“We are excited to resume the 2020 USL Championship Season with our first match on FOX Sports Sun,” said Tampa Bay Rowdies President Lee Cohen. “While many of our players’ families and fans are not able to sit inside Al Lang on Saturday night, they won’t have to miss out on watching their Rowdies in action thanks to FOX Sports Sun.”
The club also revealed that play-by-play broadcaster Drew Fellios and analyst Ryan Davis will be returning to host the action as they did last year.
This will be the first time that the Rowdies will be broadcast on FOX Sports Sun. The club went without a local television last season, but all matches are streamable through ESPN+ as part of the USL Championship’s leaguewide deal. FOX Sports Sun broadcasts games for the Tampa Bay Rays, Tampa Bay Lightning, Florida Panthers, MIami Heat, Miami Marlins and Orlando Magic. Rays ownership, which also owns the Rowdies, has been interested in getting the Rowdies on the network and the current lack of live sports due to the COVID-19 pandemic has paved the way for the Rowdies to finally make their debut.
The Rowdies’ home match against North Carolina FC is already scheduled to air on ESPN2. Future matches could air on ESPN’s family of networks as the league solidfies the rest of the year’s schedule with the network.
The USL Championship has broken its league into 8 regionalized groups of four or five teams that will compete in a 16-game regular season over the next 13 weeks. The Rowdies have been placed in Group H with Atlanta, Miami FC and Charleston Battery. The matchup with North Carolina as well as the meetings with Birmingham Legion FC and Philadelphia Union II will be the club’s only games outside of the group. The top two teams from each group will advance to the single elimination postseason that will kick off in the second week of October.
