Jason P. Combs Drives 7% Sports Surge at Scripps
Scripps said its Local Media division posted a sports surge in the first quarter of 2026, with core advertising revenue rising 7% as live sports carried the quarter. The division generated $331 million in revenue, and Jason P. Combs said the company’s live sports strategy helped drive the result.
Jason P. Combs on Q1
"Our Local Media division delivered a strong performance with industry-leading 7% core advertising revenue growth, driven by our unique live sports strategy," Combs said. He also said, "During the first quarter, our Local Media division revenue was $331 million, up 5.8% from first quarter 2025."
The growth was not broad-based luck. Combs said, "Local core advertising year-over-year growth was largely driven by advertising sales tied to our National Hockey League telecasts." Scripps pointed to a strong contribution from its newest rights agreement with the Tampa Bay Lightning, along with gains in its existing NHL deals with the Vegas Golden Knights, Utah Mammoth, and Florida Panthers.
NHL Rights and Q1 Growth
Scripps also said the Winter Olympics and the Super Bowl contributed to Q1 core advertising growth. The company said services, automotive, and gambling categories all grew in the quarter, while political advertising revenue was nearly $9 million as it began what it described as a record-breaking spending cycle.
The sports push kept widening. Last month, Scripps announced a fifth full-season NHL sports rights agreement with the Nashville Predators to start that fall, and in the first quarter it completed a new affiliation agreement with ABC covering 17 ABC affiliates. Those moves sit alongside the launch of the Scripps Sports Network, a premium free streaming channel.
Headwinds Beyond Local Media
Combs said the company was also pressing ahead with its broader transformation strategy and debt reduction efforts. He said, "We are progressing rapidly on executing our comprehensive transformation strategy, which has helped drive significant improvement in our first quarter net leverage to under four times." He added that Scripps continues to work toward station swaps with Gray and additional M&A activity to support debt reduction and operating performance.
The Local Media result matters because it came while other parts of the business faced weaker direct response advertising and audience measurement changes in Scripps Networks. For the quarter, the live-sports-led local ad gain gave Scripps a cleaner growth story, with NHL telecasts doing most of the heavy lifting and a fifth full-season Predators deal already set to start that fall.
