Monumental Sports Network is celebrating its first season since announcing the rebrand of the network last June. The regional sports network, which is the exclusive local media rightsholder for the Washington Capitals, Washington Wizards and Washington Mystics, was formed after Monumental Sports & Entertainment acquired NBC Sports Washington in August 2022. The company transformed the network by retaining and transitioning NBC Sports Washington employees and creating an executive team with vast media experience. Over the last year, the company focused on combining the linear channel and its digital assets into a digitally focused media platform that can facilitate both future success and sustained growth.
“While our focus during the 2022-23 season was all about designing and developing toward the future while operating the existing day-to-day business of NBC Sports Washington, the focus of the 2023-24 season was on actually launching and implementing those new strategies to establish Monumental Sports Network as one of the most influential regional media platforms in the country,” Zach Leonsis, president of media & new enterprises at Monumental Sports & Entertainment, said in a statement.
“Our uber-talented team worked tirelessly to upgrade the viewing experience for fans, leverage cutting-edge technology, and introduce brand new platforms for distributing our content. We have received overwhelmingly positive feedback from fans all season and think the entire region will be excited by the new offerings we’ll unveil in the fall.”
Capitals live game broadcasts this past season outperformed competitor programming on numerous occasions in the P2+ demo within the Washington, D.C. designated market area, according to data from Nielsen Media Research. The live game broadcasts registered better performances than programming on FS1 99% of the time, ESPN2 95% of the time, TNT 70% of the time and ESPN 49% of the time. Playoff games on Monumental Sports Network had an 80% increase in linear household viewership from the regular season as well.
Wizards live game broadcasts outperformed competitor programming on FS1 90% of the time, ESPN2 82% of the time and TNT 61% of the time, according to Nielsen Media Research within the P2+ demo in the Washington, D.C. designated market area. Moreover, Mystics viewership has augmented by 107% year-over-year through the first 10 games on the regional sports network.
Monumental Sports Network as a whole aired over 300 live games during the 2023-24 season, the most in network history, and introduced new local programming as well. The network opened a new studio and production facility in March 2024 from which its studio content emanated. Alternate broadcasts for Capitals and Wizards games also debuted this past April, including a rotation of hosts, analysts and guests.
In the digital space, Monumental Sports Network surpassed 200,000 downloads of its app by the conclusion of the 2023-24 seasons. Hundreds of thousands of additional users streamed video on the web regularly as well. The company introduced a direct-to-consumer subscription platform to access network programming last October. On its social media channels, Monumental Sports Network elicited over 55 million total impressions and accrued 470,000 social media followers since launching its digital platform in September.
