ownership). WEWS carried the team's programming and preseason games from 2015 until 2018. The Browns returned to WKYC with the start of the 2019 regular season as part of a deal lasting through the 2021 season. Cleveland Cavaliers WKYC aired select Cleveland Cavaliers games broadcast through NBC's broadcast rights to the NBA from 1990 to 2002. News operation WKYC presently broadcasts 35 hours of locally produced newscasts each week (with 5 hours each weekday and four hours each on Saturdays and Sundays). News department history Early years and struggles Under Westinghouse, the station debuted the country's first 90-minute local news block in 1959, called Eyewitness (a precursor to the Eyewitness News format). For much of the time between NBC's repurchase of the station and the dawn of the 21st century, WKYC-TV's news department was usually a very distant third in the ratings, well behind WJW-TV and WEWS. Part of the reason was that during most of its second stint as an NBC-owned station, it served mainly as a farm system for NBC, with almost no local talent. Given Cleveland's status as a mid-major television market, most of the promising reporters or anchors that NBC employed at WKYC could end up being promoted to other higher-profile NBC-owned outlets, especially New York City flagship WNBC-TV or WMAQ-TV in nearby Chicago. Many WKYC alumni went on to long and successful careers with NBC; most notably, current Today weather anchor Al Roker served as WKYC's chief weatherman from 1978 to 1983. As a result of this practice, turnover at channel 3 was very high, and it was unable to establish any real talent continuity. In contrast, its two major competitors, WJ(K)W and WEWS, both had long-established anchor teams who often stayed together for a decade or more. It was by far NBC's weakest owned-and-operated station. From 1973 to 1984, WKYC tried to use the Action News branding several times while also using the music and graphics associated with the other NBC-owned stations, which employed the NewsCenter name. On March 19, 1984, the station dropped the Action 3 News name and adopted its current newscast moniker, Channel 3 News. WKYC also adopted a new logo and a new slogan called "Turn to 3"; the accompanying jingle was composed by Frank Gari. The "Turn to 3" jingle and image campaign was borrowed by many TV broadcasters around the world—most notably Detroit's WXYZ-TV. Various anchors—such as Virgil