KOVR - Programming

Programming

Until late 1999, Live with Regis & Kelly (then Live with Regis & Kathie Lee) aired on KOVR, even during its affiliation with ABC. The show now airs on KCRA.

After the purchase by CBS was announced, some, including station management, had speculated that KOVR would eventually move CBS's primetime lineup back to 8–11 p.m. and add Guiding Light to its schedule, along with dropping The Jerry Springer Show. It was assumed as an O&O, that KOVR would have to carry Guiding Light. However, on May 3, 2005, it was announced that programming would remain exactly the same for the Summer and that there would be no plans to add Guiding Light.

On August 11, 2005, CBS announced that the 7–10 p.m. prime-time lineup, the 10 p.m. local newscast and the 11 p.m. airing of the Late Show with David Letterman would remain in place. The success that the station has had with the early prime-time schedule and its 10 p.m. newscast is cited as the reason for maintaining the status quo. At that point, it also stated that Guiding Light would not be added to KOVR, at least for the 2005 season, but would now be available through online streaming. The logic was that a show that had been off in the market for over 14 years would not receive good ratings. Plus there were few requests for it. Another reason was that the amount of spots available during the show would not make it profitable for the station to run it. The station did, however, change its on-air branding from the long-standing "KOVR 13" to "CBS 13" in compliance with the CBS Mandate.

On July 31, 2006, the station received approval from the network to move the weekend lineup back an hour in order to maintain an hour-long 10 p.m. newscast throughout the week. The new weekend schedule, which began August 27, will, for example, have 60 Minutes airing at 6 p.m. on Sunday nights. KOVR is now the only Pacific Time Zone CBS station to run the entire network primetime lineup beginning at 7 p.m. At the time, it was also one of two TV stations in the Sacramento market and in the Pacific Time Zone to start their network primetime lineup early, as KQCA started airing its two-hour MyNetworkTV schedule from 7 to 9 p.m. Monday through Saturday, on September 5 that same year. KQCA has since moved its primetime lineup back to the 8 to 10 p.m. timeslot.

The Late Late Show (which had been airing at 1 a.m.) moved up one hour, pushing back the Midnight showing of The Jerry Springer Show to a later time (which was seen on the station weekdays at 3 p.m. until September 8, 2006). On September 11, 2006, NBC Universal's Jerry Springer was dropped and moved to KMAX-TV, where it ran until 2007, when it was picked up by KQCA, who now airs the show at Noon and 2 PM. KOVR became the market's new home of Dr. Phil (produced by CBS-owned KingWorld, now CBS Television Distribution)--this currently airs at 3 p.m. on weekdays. Guiding Light would also continue to not be run and Montel Williams continued to air at 2 p.m. weekdays. In July 2006, Maury Povich was dropped in favor of a 4 p.m. newscast on weekdays. That fall, the schedule basically remained the same as during the previous season. The station continued preempting Guiding Light for the 2007–2008 season.

In the fall of 2008, KOVR again declined to add Guilding Light, even though Montel Williams was canceled by co-owned CBS Television Distribution that September. The double run of Montel Williams was scaled back to air in reruns once a day at 9 a.m. weekdays. Its old 2 p.m. time slot would now be occupied by the Dr. Phil spin-off, The Doctors.

On April 1, 2009, it was announced that CBS was finally canceling Guiding Light altogether and its last airdate would be September 18. On August 3, it was announced a new version of Let's Make a Deal would replace the soap beginning on October 5, 2009. Between those dates, an additional hour of The Price Is Right would be run. On September 4, 2009, KOVR ran Frasier reruns for two weeks while Guiding Light aired its last two weeks of episodes. On September 21, Price Is Right's additional temporary hour ran from 9 to 10 a.m. Let's Make A Deal from CBS (seen in most of the country in the afternoon following The Talk) currently runs on KOVR at 9 a.m. on a delayed basis so as to run as part of a game show block with Price Is Right. So, in effect, KOVR currently runs the entire CBS schedule, although its prime-time schedule continues to run from 7–10 p.m.