It’s going to be a very busy week around the old Pirate
Sports Radio Network.
Thursday afternoon we leave for Murfreesboro, TN, for ECU’s
basketball season opener at Middle Tennessee on Friday night with airtime at
7:30 p.m. The team will charter back immediately following the game and
arrive in Greenville around 1:00 a.m.
We’ll hustle down to UBE for Pirate preview at 9:00 a.m.
Saturday morning and then to the stadium for the Texas Christian football
game at 2:00 p.m.
Sunday afternoon at 1:30, it’s back on the air for Pirate
hoops with Mississippi in town for a big one on the hardwood.
The weekend concludes with Steve Logan’s Call-In Radio Show
Sunday night at 7:00 p.m. If you’re looking for a “Pirate Fix” this week is
your week.
We’re really excited about a football-basketball
doubleheader this weekend in Greenville. I hope it can become an annual
event.
Back in the old days, football would end and basketball
would start. Not any more. This year the Pirates will play six basketball
games before the end of the football season.
Our basketball crew is back with some old faces and some new
ones.
Si Seymour begins his fifth season as our analyst. The
former head coach at Craven Community College, who happens to be an ECU
grad, does a great job and is a real joy to work with. Si adds that coaching
perspective to our broadcasts and has a great knowledge of the game. His
insights during the action provide the listener with a keen sense of what’s
happening and why.
When yours truly has a football conflict with our television
duties on WITN Channel 7, we have a pinch hitter on radio play-by-play. Rick
Dayton filled that role for a number of years but he won’t be back this
year. Dayton accepted a news anchor job at WSAZ Television in Huntington,
WV.
Stepping in this year will be veteran Raleigh broadcaster
Reece Edwards. Edwards has a wealth of experience with public television and
radio and has over 25 years experience in play-by-play.
You don’t hear these guys, but Paul Rogers, Garrett Killian,
Warren Baker and newcomers Ron Evans and Greg Pierce will be our
engineers-producers.
We’ll televise three games on WITN this year and Billy
Weaver will join me for the telecasts. We’ll announce those games soon along
with a women’s game we’ll be producing. It’s time to “hoop it up.”
News ‘n Notes from Pirate
Land…
Fans were still talking about the shooting display former
Georgia Tech and Chowan College standout Fred Vinson put on last Tuesday
night. Vinson had thirty-three points in EA Sports win over the Pirates.
He was in an absolute zone. Those shots weren’t even hitting the rim.
Football fans who want to hear some intelligent sports
talk need to listen to Bill Curry on ESPN Radio Wednesday mornings at 7:30
a.m. When Bill was the head coach at Georgia Tech, I did some shows and
games with him on WSB Radio. He’s first class and has really found a niche
on the air after getting out of coaching. The former Packer has a million
Vince Lombardi stories.
Talk about old coaches, did you see the story on
80-year-old Lou Saban on ESPN 2? Saban is at Chowan College and hopefully
we’ll get him on the air with us soon. I would imagine he has a few
stories, too.
Last week, I volunteered myself to be a “guinea pig” in
East Carolina University’s Human Performance Laboratory. I spent two
mornings going through a series of cardiovascular risk assessment tests.
We’re making a television feature out of my evaluation that you may see
soon. All of us are trying to get the word out that ECU offers this very
important health and fitness test. WITN’s Alex Radow shot the video of my
exploits and delighted in watching me get tortured. It’s really not that
bad and you might consider doing it yourself. The Human Performance Lab
can be reached at 252-328-4689. Jennifer McCartney heads up the program.
