KVDT

KVDT (103.3

In 2000, KEMM was acquired by ABC/Disney. It went silent on September 28, 2000. This was in preparation of a move to the more lucrative Dallas market, to become the home for ESPN Radio programming.

ESPN Radio 103.3

The city of license was switched to Allen and the transmitter was relocated to Collinsville in 2001. The station was re-launched on April 27, 2001, as 103.3 KESN with a new sports radio format. Fourteen outlying stations were rearranged and relocated to make way for KESN to move into DFW, all at ABC/Disney's expense. Among KESN's most notable local programs was Galloway and Company, hosted by Randy Galloway until his retirement in October 2013.^[3]

Despite different owners and a merger of

Beginning in the 2011 Major League Baseball season, KESN and KZMP acquired the rights to broadcast all Texas Rangers baseball games for the next four years. English-language broadcasts aired on KESN while the Spanish-language broadcasts were heard on KZMP.^[4] These broadcasts were in addition to the Dallas Mavericks broadcasts that were already heard on KESN. Rangers games remained on KESN until the 2015 season, when they returned to KRLD-FM.

Until mid-2011, KESN broadcast in HD Radio, with its HD2 signal simulcasting KZMP (ESPN Deportes Radio) and its HD3 substation broadcasting an audio simulcast of ESPNews. The HD broadcasts were later discontinued. Because the license to broadcast digital HD Radio is perpetual, the station could resume digital broadcasts at any time.

LMA with Cumulus

On August 7, 2013, it was announced that Cumulus Media, owner of KESN's rival KTCK, would take over operations of ESPN 103.3 through a long-term local marketing agreement (LMA) with Disney, beginning on October 8. Programming on both stations would remain the same. The change took effect once Cumulus closed on the sale of FM station KTDK 104.1 of Sanger to Whitley Media.^[5][6][7] However, on September 20, 2013, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) rejected the sale citing that the license transfer was not a true sale in that all economic risk would remain with Cumulus as Whitley would get the same brokerage fee regardless of the price the station would have sold for. Cumulus would remain the de facto owner of the station.^[8] Eventually, the license of KTDK 104.1 was cancelled, and its call sign was deleted by the FCC on October 18, 2013, at the request of Cumulus.^[9]

In 2015, KESN became the only Disney/ABC-owned station on FM.^[10] Former sister station KZMP (1540 AM) aired Spanish language sports programming until September 2016, when it was flipped to a Regional Mexican format. The change left the DFW market without an ESPN Deportes Radio affiliate until its re-affiliation in July 2018. ESPN Deportes Radio discontinued its radio broadcasts in September 2019.

End of Cumulus LMA

All local programming on KESN, with the exception of the Dallas Mavericks games, ended on October 7, 2020, following the expiration of the LMA with Cumulus.^[11] The station then began broadcasting only ESPN Radio network programming, with no local shows, except for Dallas Mavericks games. Prior to the end of local programming on KESN, share ratings for KESN's primary shows lagged behind that of rival sports outlets KTCK-FM and KRLD-FM.

On August 23, 2021,

The sale was consummated on March 9, 2022, at which point the station joined the VCY America network at 10:30 p.m. This changeover left the Dallas-Fort Worth area without an ESPN Radio affiliate.[15]^[16] The station changed its call sign to KVDT on March 22, 2022. The call letters represent the VCY network and the words Dallas and Texas.

Signal

Unlike most of the area's FM stations, which transmit their signals from Cedar Hill, KVDT transmits its signal from an area east of Collinsville. Therefore, KVDT's signal is much stronger in the northern parts of the Dallas–Fort Worth metroplex, including Dallas, Decatur, Denton, and McKinney.

The signal is also strong in cities further north and outside of the Metroplex such as Gainesville, Sherman, and Bonham, to as far north as Ardmore and Durant in Oklahoma. In Fort Worth and areas south of Dallas, the station's signal is considerably weaker, which has caused problems for some of its listeners in these areas, especially during the sports radio era where listeners were following live sporting events.

Notable on-air staff

Former

• Tim Cowlishaw
• Randy Galloway
• Michael Irvin
• Nate Newton
• Marc Stein

References

External links

• vcyamerica.org
• KVDT in the FCC FM station database
• KVDT in Nielsen Audio's FM station database
• DFW Radio/TV History