How Much Does It Cost To Watch Penn State Football On TV

If you’ve listened to the podcast or read the blog, you know about Bill and Linda, 74 and 72, of York, PA. 

They are our most stereotypical, definitely real Penn State fans you can think of. 

Well, Bill and Linda have a son, Scott, and Scott is also a Penn State football fan. However, Scott, 34, also of York, hasn’t always had his life together and is just now moving out of Bill and Linda’s basement after living there since he graduated in 2014.

And of course, he wants to watch Penn State football games this season. But what’s the cheapest way for him to do this? 

Well, Scott, we’ve put together a guide for you. In this guide, we’re going to assume several things. First, Scott doesn’t have a reliable enough car to make the drive from York to State College so he will only be able to watch every Penn State game this year from your couch. 

Secondly, he’s already paying for power at his new place and as a celebration of him moving out, Linda bought you a new 55-inch TV with a Roku built into it. No extra hardware needed and we won’t include the cost to power the TV in the numbers below. . 

Lastly, we’re going to assume Penn State can appear on every possible network this season and postseason. In the regular season that includes CBS, Fox, NBC, FS1 and BTN, which you will need for five billing cycles starting in August. The December billing cycle would cover any national championship appearance. You’ll also need Peacock for four billing cycles just in case another game appears on the streaming service. Lastly we also have to assume that Penn State will make at minimum the first round and quarterfinals of the College Football Playoff. That means that you’ll need ESPN for that quarterfinal game and because of a deal with Turner, you’ll need access to TNT for that first round game. 

So what else does Scott need? 

He’s going to need internet access, largely because of Peacock. And because he’s a massive SSSWS fan, he’ll need it for at least all five months of coverage. 

Here are Scott’s four mostly viable options. (Prices have been rounded to the nearest dollar and no taxes were added in.)

Streaming – Unreliable 

The absolute cheapest way to watch every game would be to buy an internet plan. Scott found a good deal with Xfinity, which all said and told, is $45 per month on the one-year contract they’re offering to new customers. It offers 300 megabits per second speeds – which aren’t the most reliable but pretty good. This is cheapest and slowest option Xfinity offers in his area.

From there, he then uses a sketchy Russian streaming site he found on Reddit.

The good news about this option is he’ll pick a second and third language because every broadcast is either in Spanish and Japanese. 

The bad news is the virus the Russian website put on his work computer caused it to quite literally catch on fire, a massive data leak at his company and him to then lose his job because of all of that. 

Total cost for the entire season: $225 plus the lawsuit settlement he had to pay for that data leak. 

Traditional Cable and Internet 

Realizing the Russian streaming option isn’t the safest and the internet speed might not be fast enough for streaming and tweet obscenities at his favorite beat writers, Scott opts to look at the route his parents Bill and Linda have been using for years. 

Good old fashion cable and internet. 

Xfinity is the only provider in the area Scott lives in but at least offers discounts for new customers. He’ll need the “Popular TV” plan to get all of the channels he’d need. Plus because he’s upgrading the internet to the 1000 megabits per second speed – plenty fast enough – he’ll get Peacock included for free. 

The only problem is he’ll need to add in the equipment like a router and TV box but overall a much better option for watching Dear Old State. 

Total cost for the entire season: $825  

Streaming – Reliable 

While searching for options, Scott decides to get into an argument about why Beau Pribula should be the starter in a Facebook group. And during his scrolling, the ads for streaming cable options start coming. Scott’s dad Bill still isn’t the biggest fan of the internet so he never fully tried these options out. Scott is willing to try and prices them out. 

*Fubo doesn’t include TNT so Max subscription would give you those games.

The winner? YouTube TV. This is largely thanks to their $53 for four month new customer promotion offer.  

Add in the 1,000 MBPS internet and it’s still cheaper than the traditional cable route. (Plus his favorite podcast hosts Darian and Steve use YouTube TV and highly recommend it.)

Total cost for the season: $610 

Streaming – Cheapest 

Still not quite satisfied with all of the options, Scott decides to see what the cheapest available option to him would be.

Scott could roll his internet back to that original 300 Mbps speed. From there, he considers ordering rabbit ears from Amazon for about $20-$30. However, he quickly remembers he’ll only be able to get CBS, NBC and Fox over the air. It’d cover a few games this season but not all of them. 

So he’ll still need YouTube TV. Plus he’ll need Peacock because that lower internet speed doesn’t include it, which adds another $32 for the season. The main risk here is that the internet isn’t as fast and Scott does like to stream his EA Sports College Football Dynasty on Twitch. It’s something to consider.

Total cost for the season: $542

The Options 

Scott’s Pick: 

He goes with the reliable streaming option. The benefits of the faster speed of internet for not much more money is worth skipping a few Chipotle runs. Mainly, we’re proud of Scott for finally moving out and making a smart economic decision. 

If you’ve enjoyed this content, please subscribe to Stuff Somers Says With Steve on YouTube. Or join our newsletter by entering your email below.