I was really hoping the thumpin we put on Marshall might result in an "upgrade" to ESPN 2. Too short a notice for something like that Alex?
Definitely. While you do often see 6 and 12 day selections, those games in play are left "TBA." Big East generally has fewer of those than other more big-time leagues like SEC and Big 10.
ESPN has a number of games each year stipulated in their contracts with conferences that have to appear on ESPN/2 and ESPNU, and the lower limits for the MAC are exceeded with games already selected. However, there are a few selection dates for the MAC where a game will appear on both 2 and U in the same timeslot, and which game appears where can be decided later in the year base on performance. For example, our game with BG is in the same slot as Miami @ Western Michigan. One will appear on each network, so we can play our way up to a game on 2 there. There are a couple other selection dates, one like that, and the ESPNU/3 split window the day after Thanksgiving we've played our way onto the U the last two years, but Ohio isn't in the mix for either of those, because our games are already confirmed to be on U and 2, respectively, those weeks.
Hope that makes some sense! It's a somewhat complex system.