Recent from talks
WTOV-TV
Knowledge base stats:
Talk channels stats:
Members stats:
WTOV-TV
WTOV-TV (channel 9) is a television station licensed to Steubenville, Ohio, United States, serving the Wheeling, West Virginia–Steubenville, Ohio market as an affiliate of NBC and Fox. Owned by Sinclair Broadcast Group, the station maintains studios and transmitter facilities on Burr Avenue in Mingo Junction, Ohio (mailing address reads Red Donley Plaza in Steubenville).
The station went on air as WSTV-TV (for Steubenville) on December 24, 1953. It was owned by Rust Craft Broadcasting along with WSTV radio (1340 AM), which went off the air in 2011, and 103.5 FM (now WNKV). When the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) opened bidding for the channel 9 license, Rust Craft and CBS emerged as the favorites. CBS planned to move the station's license to Pittsburgh in order to get its own station in what was then the sixth-largest market. However, the FCC turned CBS' bid down. The major cities in the Upper Ohio Valley are so close together that they must share the VHF band, and the FCC had opted not to issue any more VHF construction permits to Pittsburgh in order to give Wheeling–Steubenville and the other smaller markets in the area a chance to get on the air. The Wheeling–Steubenville TV market, despite its very close proximity to Pittsburgh and overlapping signals, remains a separate market today.
Channel 9 was originally a CBS affiliate, but also carried a secondary affiliation with ABC, sharing that network's programming with NBC affiliate WTRF-TV (channel 7). It changed its call letters to WTOV (standing for "We're Television for the Ohio Valley") on June 1, 1979, after Rust Craft merged with Ziff Davis and sold off the radio stations. The call letters had been previously used for a TV station in Portsmouth, Virginia that is now WGNT. During its time as a CBS affiliate, the station struggled in the ratings due to the presence of Group W powerhouse KDKA-TV (channel 2) in Pittsburgh, which to this day remains widely viewable in the area both over-the-air and available on cable.
The station began phasing out ABC in the 1970s, but continued to carry a few ABC programs in off-hours for many years. Channel 9 had little need to air many ABC shows due to the presence of WTAE-TV (channel 4), Youngstown affiliate WYTV (channel 33), and to a lesser extent Columbus affiliate WTVN-TV (channel 6, now WSYX) on cable systems in the area; WSYX is now a sister station to channel 9.
On January 7, 1980, WTOV swapped affiliations with WTRF and became an NBC affiliate. At the time of the switch, NBC had struggled in the ratings for a number of years and then-market leader WTRF wanted a stronger affiliation. However, in the ensuing years the affiliation switch began to benefit WTOV. For starters, instead of competing with KDKA-TV for network programming from the nearby Pittsburgh market, WTOV now competed with future sister station WIIC-TV, channel 11 (which became WPXI the following year), which, until recently, had been one of NBC's weakest major-market affiliates. Secondly, NBC as a whole began to improve in the ratings in the early 1980s, and by the middle of the decade, was America's most-watched network, while CBS went through a serious decline that the network would not recover from until the late 1990s. The affiliation with NBC also gave the station rights to carry the majority of Steelers games via the NFL on NBC package until 1997, and since 2006 a few games per year via NBC's Sunday Night Football, allowing it a good opportunity to establish itself with viewers (the station is within the 75-mile (121 km) NFL blackout contour, though the Steelers have never had a blackout since the current NFL blackout policy went into effect). These factors led WTOV-TV to surpass WTRF-TV in the ratings in the Wheeling–Steubenville market, a position it now holds by a wide margin.
In 1983, Ziff Davis sold WTOV, along with then-sister stations WEYI-TV in Saginaw, Michigan, WRDW-TV in Augusta, Georgia, and WROC-TV in Rochester, New York, to Television Station Partners, L.P. Under the new ownership, channel 9 was the last NBC affiliate known to have used the old "Proud N" in its branding, keeping it for two years after NBC adopted its current simplified peacock logo in 1986. WTOV, along with WEYI and WROC, were sold to Smith Broadcast Group in 1996. In 2000, Cox Enterprises acquired WTOV, along with fellow NBC affiliate WJAC-TV in Johnstown, Pennsylvania, on the other side of the Pittsburgh market, from Sunrise/STC Broadcasting (one of several subsidiaries of Smith Broadcasting). The station dropped the remaining ABC shows from its schedule soon after Cox took over. It also updated its logo to resemble that of sister station WPXI in Pittsburgh, and along with WJAC, the three were occasionally marketed together as a result until WPXI revamped its news graphics and music package.
WTOV's broadcasts became digital-only, effective June 12, 2009.
The station airs tape-delayed high school football games of the week including numerous playoff games of local teams and Wheeling Nailers hockey games (at one point preempting a Manchester United–Chelsea Premier League game in 2014, to the ire of local viewers). On June 3, 2010, Dish Network added WTOV, along with PBS member station WOUC and CBS affiliate WTRF (and the latter station's digital subchannels) as the local stations available to its subscribers in the Steubenville–Wheeling market. WTOV and the other Steubenville–Wheeling area television stations were added to DirecTV on November 23, 2010.
Hub AI
WTOV-TV AI simulator
(@WTOV-TV_simulator)
WTOV-TV
WTOV-TV (channel 9) is a television station licensed to Steubenville, Ohio, United States, serving the Wheeling, West Virginia–Steubenville, Ohio market as an affiliate of NBC and Fox. Owned by Sinclair Broadcast Group, the station maintains studios and transmitter facilities on Burr Avenue in Mingo Junction, Ohio (mailing address reads Red Donley Plaza in Steubenville).
The station went on air as WSTV-TV (for Steubenville) on December 24, 1953. It was owned by Rust Craft Broadcasting along with WSTV radio (1340 AM), which went off the air in 2011, and 103.5 FM (now WNKV). When the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) opened bidding for the channel 9 license, Rust Craft and CBS emerged as the favorites. CBS planned to move the station's license to Pittsburgh in order to get its own station in what was then the sixth-largest market. However, the FCC turned CBS' bid down. The major cities in the Upper Ohio Valley are so close together that they must share the VHF band, and the FCC had opted not to issue any more VHF construction permits to Pittsburgh in order to give Wheeling–Steubenville and the other smaller markets in the area a chance to get on the air. The Wheeling–Steubenville TV market, despite its very close proximity to Pittsburgh and overlapping signals, remains a separate market today.
Channel 9 was originally a CBS affiliate, but also carried a secondary affiliation with ABC, sharing that network's programming with NBC affiliate WTRF-TV (channel 7). It changed its call letters to WTOV (standing for "We're Television for the Ohio Valley") on June 1, 1979, after Rust Craft merged with Ziff Davis and sold off the radio stations. The call letters had been previously used for a TV station in Portsmouth, Virginia that is now WGNT. During its time as a CBS affiliate, the station struggled in the ratings due to the presence of Group W powerhouse KDKA-TV (channel 2) in Pittsburgh, which to this day remains widely viewable in the area both over-the-air and available on cable.
The station began phasing out ABC in the 1970s, but continued to carry a few ABC programs in off-hours for many years. Channel 9 had little need to air many ABC shows due to the presence of WTAE-TV (channel 4), Youngstown affiliate WYTV (channel 33), and to a lesser extent Columbus affiliate WTVN-TV (channel 6, now WSYX) on cable systems in the area; WSYX is now a sister station to channel 9.
On January 7, 1980, WTOV swapped affiliations with WTRF and became an NBC affiliate. At the time of the switch, NBC had struggled in the ratings for a number of years and then-market leader WTRF wanted a stronger affiliation. However, in the ensuing years the affiliation switch began to benefit WTOV. For starters, instead of competing with KDKA-TV for network programming from the nearby Pittsburgh market, WTOV now competed with future sister station WIIC-TV, channel 11 (which became WPXI the following year), which, until recently, had been one of NBC's weakest major-market affiliates. Secondly, NBC as a whole began to improve in the ratings in the early 1980s, and by the middle of the decade, was America's most-watched network, while CBS went through a serious decline that the network would not recover from until the late 1990s. The affiliation with NBC also gave the station rights to carry the majority of Steelers games via the NFL on NBC package until 1997, and since 2006 a few games per year via NBC's Sunday Night Football, allowing it a good opportunity to establish itself with viewers (the station is within the 75-mile (121 km) NFL blackout contour, though the Steelers have never had a blackout since the current NFL blackout policy went into effect). These factors led WTOV-TV to surpass WTRF-TV in the ratings in the Wheeling–Steubenville market, a position it now holds by a wide margin.
In 1983, Ziff Davis sold WTOV, along with then-sister stations WEYI-TV in Saginaw, Michigan, WRDW-TV in Augusta, Georgia, and WROC-TV in Rochester, New York, to Television Station Partners, L.P. Under the new ownership, channel 9 was the last NBC affiliate known to have used the old "Proud N" in its branding, keeping it for two years after NBC adopted its current simplified peacock logo in 1986. WTOV, along with WEYI and WROC, were sold to Smith Broadcast Group in 1996. In 2000, Cox Enterprises acquired WTOV, along with fellow NBC affiliate WJAC-TV in Johnstown, Pennsylvania, on the other side of the Pittsburgh market, from Sunrise/STC Broadcasting (one of several subsidiaries of Smith Broadcasting). The station dropped the remaining ABC shows from its schedule soon after Cox took over. It also updated its logo to resemble that of sister station WPXI in Pittsburgh, and along with WJAC, the three were occasionally marketed together as a result until WPXI revamped its news graphics and music package.
WTOV's broadcasts became digital-only, effective June 12, 2009.
The station airs tape-delayed high school football games of the week including numerous playoff games of local teams and Wheeling Nailers hockey games (at one point preempting a Manchester United–Chelsea Premier League game in 2014, to the ire of local viewers). On June 3, 2010, Dish Network added WTOV, along with PBS member station WOUC and CBS affiliate WTRF (and the latter station's digital subchannels) as the local stations available to its subscribers in the Steubenville–Wheeling market. WTOV and the other Steubenville–Wheeling area television stations were added to DirecTV on November 23, 2010.
Recent media