ESPN has had a hole in its daily lineup ever since canceling Around the Horn back in May. But according to ESPN President of Content Burke Magnus, the network is in no rush to name a permanent replacement.
It has been previously reported that Scott Van Pelt was the leading contender to make the 5 p.m. ET slot his new home at ESPN after serving for years as the host of the late-night SportsCenter. Peter Schrager and Brian Windhorst have been other names believed to be considered.
And in commenting on the situation in an appearance on the SI Media podcast with Jimmy Traina, Magnus made it clear that SVP is an ideal candidate. But he would prefer a situation where Van Pelt would work daily at 5 p.m. ET while also hosting his late-night SportsCenter after major sporting events and Monday Night Football.
“We would like to have a little bit of both worlds,” Magnus stated. “Obviously the contemplation at 5 o’clock is a daily show. But in addition to that, I’ll just use Scott as an example here, this is not finalized or anything close to that, but you know how we feel about him, obviously. He’s at the very peak of our talent roster. But, if 5 o’clock happens, Scott would continue to do, let’s take Mondays for example, he’d continue to do Monday Night Countdown on the NFL and since he’s there, he would also continue to do SportsCenter after Monday Night Football.
“We would like there to be, I don’t know what the number would be, but we’d like there to be a bunch of those nights throughout the year where Scott would continue to do midnight after the biggest events on the sports calendar whether they were ours or something else. And that would be the best outcome possible.”
Magnus also added that Van Pelt isn’t necessarily asking off of the late night SportsCenter, but it’s clearly the direction the network is leaning. There’s a reason why his name is being openly discussed by one of ESPN’s top executives and nobody else.
But when it comes to actually making a decision, Magnus says that any new show might not come until Fall 2026 to coincide with the launch of the football season. Part of that is due to the sports calendar, and part of it is due to the current 5 p.m. ET SportsCenter outperforming Around the Horn according to the ESPN executive.
“We currently have the luxury of the fact that the SportsCenter half-hour that we put at 5 o’clock is doing very well, better than Around the Horn,” Magnus said. “So we have it pretty good where it is now and every month that goes by we continue to get Scott doing the late-night show, which is really, really important and valuable to us that he likes doing. He’s not asking off of that show, by the way. We’re going to continue to roll that for a while while we not only figure out the talent but also figure out the creative format and concept of what that half-hour show is.”
“We’ve got some time. SportsCenter is doing well. I would suspect we would use as much time as possible and then maybe do like we do with so many other things, launch around football season in ’26.”
The 5 p.m. ET slot certainly seems like it belongs to Scott Van Pelt if he wants it and ESPN can figure out a way to put him in the afternoons permanently while also having him host major SportsCenter episodes in late night. When ESPN canceled Around the Horn initially, going a full year with an interim SportsCenter in place probably wasn’t the initial plan. But the network is hoping that it will be worth the wait.
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