College Football Fans Outraged Over New SEC on ABC Anthem

It is a massive year for the SEC after the conference added two of college football’s most prominent programs, Texas and Oklahoma. The conference is also entering its first year of a ten-year deal with ABC and ESPN, both owned by parent company Disney.

Of course, this means a shift away from the SEC on CBS and its iconic anthem, which was nearly universally loved by fans across the country as they tuned into one of the conference’s premier games every Saturday afternoon.

In July, the new graphics and score bug were released and garnered largely positive reviews from fans on social media. However, on Thursday, ABC/ESPN released the anthem for the broadcast composed by Bob Christianson, the creator of the iconic NHL on ESPN theme and inspired by the network’s anthem from the early 2000s, but things went south quickly.

In addition to the anthem receiving poor reviews, it appears that around the 0:09 mark, the network botched both the shade of orange and the color of the facemask on the Longhorns’ helmet, despite a later depiction of the iconic Texas helmet appearing correct.

As the SEC had at least one team in 37 of the 50 games with the highest TV rating in 2023, this will likely just annoy fans and not turn a significant number away, but it certainly isn’t the best start for ABC entering a deal with the conference for a decade.