STANDISH, ME – The Saint Joseph’s College Athletics Department is proud to announce a three-year partnership with Stretch Internet to provide live and on-demand streaming. The Stretch Internet Game Central portal, www.gomonks.tv, will be up and running before the start of the 2012 fall campaign.
The Saint Joseph’s Sports Information Department has plans to provide live video for the home events of 10 teams: field hockey, men’s and women’s soccer and volleyball in the fall, men’s and women’s basketball and men’s and women’s swimming in the winter, and baseball and softball in the spring.
Unfortunately, due to an unreliable internet connection, we are currently unable to broadcast the men’s and women’s lacrosse contests played off campus at Deering Memorial Stadium in Portland.
Gomonks.tv will provide the ultimate interactive experience for Monks fans. The custom-designed interface (see image below) will feature live video, live audio (when applicable), live chats, and live stats and users can easily register for an account and begin chatting away with other fans during live events.
Perhaps more important than the aforementioned features is Stretch Internet’s outstanding customer service. The folks at Stretch Internet take pride in offering top-notch customer service, as the company provides support to all viewers with a "Frequently Asked Questions" link at the bottom of the portal as well as an email link, which allows viewers to communicate directly with Stretch Internet support staff.
During the 2011-12 academic year, St. Joe’s streamed over 100 live events with uneven results. Those who watched our games online last year should know that invasive advertisements, poor quality feeds, and a lack of customer service are things of the past.
Even though we had issues at times using our past video stream provider, using their service was a huge first step for SJC athletics in the webstreaming realm and the price was right for our department and our viewers alike: free. Feedback from the SJC coaching staff and our followers made it clear that we should move in a different direction and, as a result, events will be streamed via Stretch Internet a pay-per-view basis starting this fall.
Our pay-per-view model provides fans with the options of purchasing single-event tickets for $10.95, season-ticket passes for $29.95 and all-sports packages for $79.95.
The Stretch Internet service also includes an "on-demand" feature that allows viewers to watch past events. The purchase of a single event allows the viewer to re-watch the contest as many times as they wish. Those who decide to purchase season tickets or the all-sports package will enjoy the same feature for all events in the sport they choose or all sports, respectively.
What's more, fans will be able to view and listen to events on a wide variety of devices. Video streaming is currently supported on any iOS device (iPhone, iPad, iPod Touch) or any phone or tablet that has Flash 10.1 or greater (primarily the Android market). If you currently are able to view video on sites such as YouTube, ESPN or Hulu, you can access gomonks.tv without issue. Also, by utilizing Flash, fans will enjoy the same experience across all platforms and browsers (PC or Mac, Explorer, Chrome, Firefox, etc.).
The women’s soccer match versus Regis College on Sunday, September 2nd (1:00 PM) will be the first event broadcasted on gomonks.tv.
Stretch Internet, based in Mesa, AZ, was founded in 2003 by a former college athletics media relations professional who saw a need to provide affordable, high-quality streaming to college and university athletic departments. Stretch Internet now works with nearly 300 colleges and universities, high schools and professional sports organizations. A devotion to utilizing the best streaming technology possible and providing a first-class presentation - backed by the best customer support in the business - have helped Stretch Internet become one of the largest streaming media specialists in the sports industry.