ACC's Jim Phillips 'not worried' about Duke-Amazon deal

AMELIA ISLAND, Fla. -- A new agreement between Duke men's basketball and Amazon to broadcast three Blue Devils nonconference games was a hot-button issue among ACC athletics directors during the league's spring meetings this week, but commissioner Jim Phillips said he's fully supportive of the school's "creative" plan for generating new revenue.

Duke announced a multiyear agreement with the streaming service that includes three nonconference games -- against UConn, Gonzaga and Michigan -- to be broadcast on Prime Video next season, a first foray into college basketball for Amazon. The move immediately raised eyebrows among college administrators who saw broader implications for media rights packages.

Phillips reiterated Wednesday that ESPN and the ACC were fully aware and supportive of the deal, and both parties had worked closely with Duke throughout the negotiating process.

"I'm not worried about it at all," Phillips said. "ESPN was in every one of those conversations, and to Duke's credit, they came up with something creative and brought it to ESPN and to us."

Big Ten commissioner Tony Petitti was less enthusiastic, arguing Michigan's inclusion in the package in a game to be played at Madison Square Garden should come with a cut of the revenue going to his conference.

Duke athletics director Nina King said the news shouldn't have come as a surprise to the Big Ten, but acknowledged Petitti's terse response could result in Michigan ultimately pulling out of the game.

"That's between Michigan and the Big Ten and FOX to work on all that," King said. "From Day 1 with Michigan, we told them what the plan was."

The plan came as surprising news to other ACC administrators, however.

While ESPN owns the broadcast rights to all ACC games, Duke was able to leverage its nonconference inventory to play games outside the league's geographic footprint and sell those rights to Amazon -- a loophole that several ADs suggested could open the floodgates for other schools to monetize their out-of-conference games, too.

"At some point you've got to draw the line, and the line had been drawn previously in an acceptable area," one ACC AD said. "Now that we've crossed the Rubicon, where do you draw the line?"