The NBA on Wednesday officially announced its new set of broadcast rights deals, confirming that the league will return to NBC for the first time since 2002. NBC confirmed their end of the deal shortly after, and dropped some other significant news in the process.
In a video announcement of the new deal, NBC prominently featured “Roundball Rock,” the longtime theme to the network’s NBA coverage. That clearly suggests that NBC will be bringing it back in 2025 once they take over coverage.
🗣 TURN IT UP. I LOVE THIS SONG!
The NBA is coming back – Fall 2025 on NBC and Peacock. pic.twitter.com/xz6hOVbpZE
— NBC Sports (@NBCSports) July 24, 2024
Composed by John Tesh, “Roundball Rock” is synonymous to many as the soundtrack to the Michael Jordan-led NBA of the 1990s, when NBC was the primary rightsholder. Once it emerged that NBC was in the running for the new rights package, many fans immediately wondered if the song would be brought back. Tesh revealed back in May that NBC had already reached out to him about potentially using the song again, but at that point, nothing was official.
The NBA’s move back to NBC may come at a significant cost for a lot of fans. At least they can console themselves with this, which appears to be all but official.
