FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
October 15, 2002

MORE TELEVISION COVERAGE FOR
WOMEN'S WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP

More re-broadcasts of the two medal games from this summer's International Softball Federation (ISF) Women's World Championship were announced today. The two games will be shown in Canada early next month on WTSN, the world's first 24-hour network dedicated to covering women's sports.

"WTSN looks forward to bringing fans competitive and top-notch coverage of one of the most intense softball competitions in the world," said Sue Prestedge, WTSN Senior Vice-President.

The bronze medal game, between Japan and Chinese Taipei, will air on Monday night, November 4 at 8 p.m. Eastern time. The next night, at the same time, the gold medal game pitting the United States vs. Japan will be shown. Under the terms of the agreement, WTSN will have rights to air the two games up to one year after the games were played, meaning viewers can see international softball action through and including August 4, 2003.

The ISF had announced four weeks ago that America One networks will also air the gold and bronze medal games as part of a doubleheader this Sunday, October 20 (beginning at 6 p.m. Eastern time).

"This ties in with the excellent TV coverage that softball received in Sydney, Australia in 2000 during the Summer Olympics when our sport's ratings average was fourth in the top ten women's events," said ISF President Don Porter. "On a similar list for the 1996 Olympics in Atlanta, softball was ranked fifth. Along with the great coverage given (by SkySports and SBS) to our 1998 Women's World Championship in Japan, this all shows how well our sport does on television, and I'm glad that WTSN has joined in to continue this trend by showing the 2002 Women's World Championship medal games."

The games were played on Sunday, August 4 in Bob Van Impe Stadium in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan (Canada). This event was significant not only because of it bringing to the winner the title of "world champion," but also because reaching the medals round qualified those three teams plus China for the 2004 Summer Olympics, to be played in Athens, Greece.

The games were produced on-site by Hartland Productions. Tony Sellars calls the play-by-play and Elissa Walker-Campbell provides color commentary.

WTSN is a one-year old national digital network owned by CTV Specialty Television Inc.'s TSN. CTV is a division of Bell Globemedia, which also owns The Globe and Mail, Globe Interactive, and Sympatico-Lycos. WTSN's website is www.tsn.ca/wtsn.

For more information, please contact ISF Director of Communications Bruce Wawrzyniak at brucew@internationalsoftball.com or (813) 864-0100, ext. 229.