During the dark times between NBC’s previous and current NBA media rights deals, the iconic Roundball Rock theme aired during Fox Sports’ college basketball coverage.
Fox licensed the John Tesh jam in 2018 and has used Roundball Rock to intro Big East, Big Ten, and Big 12 college basketball games since then. In fact, that deal was still in place when NBC returned to the NBA game, and Fox graciously agreed to let them re-license the song even though they could have easily blocked it.
Fox Sports continues to use “Roundball Rock” for college basketball this season
(h/t @Braylon_Breeze)
https://t.co/rLU9pR6cf5
— Awful Announcing (@awfulannouncing) November 3, 2025
Fox Sports also kept using the song, as it had the right to do. However, that deal ended as of November 2026. As a result, Fox needed a new college basketball theme song.
They debuted that music over the weekend (while keeping their graphics package and score bug), as heard during its coverage of a Notre Dame-Villanova basketball doubleheader at the Eternal City Tip-Off in Rome, Italy.
https://t.co/F6bhI440cw
— Next Impulse Sports (@NextImpulse) November 2, 2026
The new song isn’t that dissimilar to Roundball Rock, and it begged the question of whether Fox simply swapped it out for a different John Tesh song.
Awful Announcing reached out to a Tesh rep, who said the tune wasn’t one of his. So it sounds like we’ve got a John Tesh knockoff in that space instead.
Regardless, for basketball coverage purists, Roundball Rock is officially back where it “belongs,” and only there.
The post Fox Sports introduces new college basketball theme after ‘Roundball Rock’ deal expired appeared first on Awful Announcing.