For first time, ABC will broadcast NCAA women's basketball championship game, in April 2023

The NCAA women's basketball title game will be broadcast this season on ABC for the first time.

The championship game, which usually airs in prime time, will be played at 3 p.m. ET on April 2. The women's Final Four is in Dallas this year.

«Scheduling the Division I women's basketball championship on ABC has been a goal for quite some time in our ongoing efforts to maximize the exposure of women's sports in collaboration with the NCAA,» said Burke Magnus, ESPN'S president for programming and original content. «Women's NCAA championships continue to generate strong audiences across the ABC/ESPN networks and this move represents yet another unique opportunity to showcase this marquee event and the student-athletes who are competing for a national championship.»

ESPN said that it would look at moving the game back to prime time in the future but currently has commitments to entertainment shows the night of the game.

Last season's championship game, in which South Carolina beat UConn, was the most viewed women's title game in nearly two decades, drawing 4.85 million viewers. The national semifinals averaged 2.7 million viewers, up 21% year over year, and was the most viewed semifinals in a decade. The full tournament averaged 634,000 viewers, up 16% from the previous year's coverage.

ESPN has aired NCAA women's tournament games on ABC for the past two seasons but not the title game.

«It's a benchmark announcement for women's basketball in being able to showcase the national championship game in Dallas for an expanded audience on ABC for the first time in 2023,» said Beth Goetz, chair of the NCAA Division I women's basketball committee and athletic director at Ball State. «We are grateful to ABC/ESPN for the partnership in