Prep livestreaming: A brief history
Livestreaming local high school games began about 2004, when Crystal Clear Sports Inc. started showing football games.
Webcast America entered the market a few years later, putting students in front of, and behind, the camera. Fox 9 launched myfoxhockey.com around the same time.
Those entities and others, have come and gone.
These days, livestreaming is available primarily through Prepspotlight.tv, which partners with the Minnesota State High School League to carry state tournament contests. At the national level there's The Cube, which was acquired by the National Federation of State High School Associations.
There are independents as well. At the school level the list includes lnpanthers.live, which Lakeville North High School debuted this school year. For hockey fans, mnhockey.tv partners with Benilde-St. Margaret's, Edina, Eden Prairie, Holy Angels and Minnetonka. Waconia High School livestreams away football games on YouTube Live.
"We got an e-mail from the guys at the American Legion telling us they put one of our games on the big screen," said Carl Pierson, the former Waconia girls' basketball coach who does play-by-play on the livestream. "It's a way to connect the community to what's going on with high school sports."
DAVID LA VAQUE
