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MISSOULA- KPAX has televised most University of Montana football games over the air for free for years, but as we reported Monday that is changing as the Big Sky Conference joins forces with a regional sports network.

You'll need to buy a cable or satellite service to see Montana versus Montana State on your screen the next time the teams kick off because the Big Sky Conference will not renew its local television contracts and instead accepted a bigger bid from Seattle-based network Root Sports.

"We are trading those pockets that maybe couldn't receive it for such a vast expansion to 8.7 million homes and all those Montanans that maybe don't live in the state of Montana so the tradeoff for me, getting people who love to watch Montana and Montana State play is tremendous," Big Sky Conference Commissioner Doug Fullerton said Tuesday.

A bigger television deal means more money for all Big Sky Conference schools, especially the ones that never received TV revenue. But University of Montana officials say that money made comes second to the expanded viewership.

"It's a changing times and I know that a lot of people get caught up in the fact that television is buying out everything. As we can tell it's not necessarily the case here - you know, if you get 20 or 30,000 dollars more, yes that's important to us, but it's nowhere near the millions and millions made at the bigger schools, at the BCS schools. So what we're looking' for is exposure. The more exposure we can get, the better off for the university of Montana so we can attract great students to this institution," UM Athletics Director Jim O'Day explained.

ROOT SPORTS will broadcast up to 18 Big Sky Conference games each season, leaving other Griz games up for grabs, meaning they could still come across the airwaves for free, but the biggest rivalry game of all is already spoken for, leaving about 17% of Montana televisions blacked out.

Big Sky Conference officials refused to tell us how much they paid ROOT for the five-year contract. The sports network has to release its schedule of games for the 2012 season by March 15th.

Many of our Facebook fans are disappointed in the new TV deal.

Jenny Palmer-Gray commented, "Bad, bad, bad decision. It really is terrible that these organizations have chosen to alienate fans that do not for whatever reason- whether financial or just do not watch that much TV choose not to subscribe to satellite TV".

Facebook fan Joan Scheel posted, "Makes me want to drop TV period! I hate being used! Bad enough that my TV bill is expensive as it is!"