CNN wouldn't do it. Neither would MSNBC or Fox News Channel. So why, ESPN reasoned, should it?

ESPN has for more than a decade repeated its late-night "SportsCenter" show throughout the morning, starting at 2 a.m. Pacific time and continuing until 10 or 11. But starting Aug. 11 — the first week of the Beijing Olympics — the network will have live "SportsCenters" from 3 a.m. to noon PT.

Among those who will anchor the program will be Hannah Storm, who has had a distinguished career in sports and news broadcasting at CNN, NBC and CBS.

Norby Williamson, ESPN's executive vice president of production, said it increasingly made little sense for the network to keep repeating highlights from the night before.

"Could you fathom a world where MSNBC or CNN or Fox News would be on tape in the morning?" Williamson said. "Of course not, because the world doesn't work like that. We found that the sports world doesn't work like that as the digital age is upon us, the world is changing and there's a 24-hour demand for sports news. It makes perfect sense that our signature franchise be live, be reactive, be proactive in this day part."

Storm, who has been an anchor on "The Early Show" on CBS for five years after covering sports for NBC and CNN, said she's never strayed too far away from sports.

"It's funny: Even six years later a lot of people still think I do sports," Storm told reporters this week. "It's just amazing because I had that loyal core following doing sports and then that's not necessarily the same audience that watches morning TV.

" I love news. It was an unbelievable place to get some journalistic chops and really hone my interviewing skills and I wouldn't trade it for anything. But sports is sports. It's something that I grew up with, that I'm passionate about, that I enjoyed every second of."

Camcorder capers: Matt Walsh, the subject of the most recent round of "Spygate" controversies, will be interviewed by Andrea Kremer on HBO's "Real Sports" at 8 tonight.

Walsh says while he worked for the New England Patriots and was filming signals of opposing defensive coaches, the team would have a backup quarterback study the film. The QB would then stand next to then-assistant coach Charlie Weis during the next game with that team and relay what defense the other team was going to run to Weis, who would then tell starting quarterback Drew Bledsoe through his helmet radio.

Walsh said it was very successful.

"One of the quarterbacks told me probably about 75 percent of the time Tampa Bay ran the defense that we thought they were going to run," Walsh tells Kremer.

Walsh also says he's puzzled at Patriots coach Bill Belichick's insistence that the tapes had little impact.

"If it was of little or no importance," Walsh says, "I imagine they wouldn't have continued to do it and probably not taken the chances of going down onto the field in Pittsburgh or shooting from other teams' stadiums the way we did."

Other notes: The Los Angeles Sparks' season debut, featuring No. 1 WNBA draft pick Candace Parker, will be at 12:30 p.m. Saturday against the defending champion Phoenix Mercury on ABC. This week's NASCAR event, the Sprint All-Star race, is not on network TV this weekend. It'll be on Speed at 4 p.m. Saturday. FSN Prime Ticket will debut a "Before the Bigs" profile on Andruw Jones of the Dodgers at 10:30 p.m. Tuesday. ... FSN West (or Prime Ticket, depending on baseball coverage) is continuing to have "Lakers Live" postgame coverage during the playoffs even though FSN is finished with televising actual games. As expected, ESPN and Tennis Channel completed a deal to share cable right for the U.S. Open.

The Dodgers Radio Network has added affiliates in Sikeston, Mo. (home of Blake DeWitt), Evansville, Ind., Mount Carmel, Ill., and Nashville, Tenn. Meanwhile, the Angels can't keep their station in Ventura. ... TNT's Charles Barkley, referring Thursday night to Kobe Bryant, Pau Gasol and Lamar Odom of the Lakers: "I think we need to move the name The Big Three' from Boston to L.A."

— Jim Carlisle