One of the chapter’s I would
like in my forthcoming book will include some of the quirky stories that have
occurred during my 42 year professional broadcast career.
What is the old saying - The show must go on?
During my early years
broadcasting Durand and Mondovi
High School football and
basketball games I remember when I was first given the play-by-play
duties. It didn’t happen when I was
first hired. Dave Comee was WRDN’s play-by-play announcer when I first arrived
on the scene. He soon left to take a similar job at WHTL FM Radio in Whitehall, Wisconsin.
Management knew I wanted the
play-by-play duties and I figured I was a “slam dunk” to get the gig,
I remember like it was
yesterday the question I was asked in my interview. “Tom, when you are calling
a Durand-Mondovi game can you stay neutral” I was surprised at the question and
at the time I thought my integrity was being questioned. In reality it was THE
question to ask to a Durand
High School
graduate. I think back to the many
Mondovi vs, Durand games I was behind the microphone while at my hometown radio
station. That question was always on my
mind during each of those games.
When calling a basketball
game in the Mondovi High School Gymnasium you had to broadcast with no table in
the middle of the Mondovi student section halfway up the bleachers. One of my broadcasts was at a Durand-Mondovi
game. A group of 8 to 10 Mondovi students sitting around me started yelling
some insults and profanity simply to have it heard on the radio. During timeouts,
while on a commercial break, I would rather forcefully tell the students to
“knock it off.” It didn’t take long for the “situation” to escalate as one of
the hooligans unplugged my extension cord knocking me off the air. I had to
scamper down below the bleachers to plug my cord back in. As I got back on the air the language started
up again. I tried to keep my composure
but I was losing the battle. I lost my
cool when a couple junior high boys knocked my scorebook, statistics and game
notes through the bleachers and onto the floor. I lost my cool and whacked one
of the culprits in the back with my clipboard.
At the time I figured the
cops would come and take me to jail.
Actually, the teacher who was in charge of crowd control that night had been
watching the situation as it progressed. As I remember after the game he told
me that he would have done the same thing!”
Had it happened in this era I would have been arrested, charged, and my
trial would probably have been seen live on CNN. How times have changed!
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It was also in Mondovi that what could have been a tragic situation occurred. I can’t remember who the Buffaloes were playing but it was a football game on a night that lightning forced virtually all area games to be suspended. I found out the next day that we were the only game not to be suspended. The sound of the thunder was scary and the lightning was constant during the first half.
We were nearing halftime
when a bolt of lightning seemingly hit the press box. The sound inside our
telephone setup was incredibly loud as we were knocked off the air. The light
bulbs in the press box turned a weird orange color and my game analyst yelled “Tom,
our (audio) mixer is smoking!” My first
though was our broadcast is done for the night. Dave and I were incredibly
fortunate. Since the incident I have had
several engineers say that we should have been electrocuted. I have personally seen two reports of a
similar situation in later years that killed two radio announcers. With
the grace of God!
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I’ve had some incredibly
talented broadcast partners calling games over the years. Dave Hoffman tops that list. The son of
former Durand School District Superintendent Vaughn Hoffman was my “game
analyst” on WRDN for the decade of the 1980s.
My favorite memories was broadcasting those incredible Durand girl’s
basketball games in the mid-to-late 1980s. I’ve been fortunate in my broadcast
career including several NCAA III National Championship games of the
UW-Whitewater football and men’s basketball teams.
The undisputed favorite game
broadcast for me was the 1986 WIAA Class
B State
Girl’s Basketball game when Durand won it’s first team sports title since 1938.
That was the year that
Durand fans started lining up at the DHS front doors at 4 a.m. to purchase
tickets to the Panthers’ tournament games.
I was a bit too excited for
the team’s tournament weekend in Madison. I made sure I had my wife and kids in the car
unfortunately we got to our hotel in Madison
only to realize I had forgotten to put me and my wife’s luggage in the trunk! Lucky our hotel was located just across East Washington Avenue
from East Towne Mall!!
Durand won the state title
that weekend on layup at the buzzer by Kim Frederickson to beat Waterford 56-54.
Waterford spent the games
final minute holding the ball in advance of taking a final shot with the score
tied at 54-all. Durand caught a break when the Wolverines took the "final" shot
too soon.
Here is how I called perhaps
the most exciting 10 seconds in Durand
High School sports history…
“Ten seconds left, Beth
Greil drives, shoots, no good. Fredrickson with the rebound. To Chris Schlosser
- (my voice turns to high anticipation) to Kim Frederickson - layup good!
Good!!! Panthers win the state championship! Do you believe in miracles? Yes! OH MY!!
Dave Hoffman and I
absolutely lose it yelling into our microphones for over a minute in giddy
elation while banging our clip boards on the railing in front of us in the first row of the balcony level at the UW Field House.
Sitting next to us watching
a pair of "lunatics" celebrate was WKOW TV 27 (Madison) sports director Jay
Wilson. I remember he was laughing, shaking his head, and telling us “that’s
what it’s all about isn’t it guys?”
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Dave Hoffman and I are calling the Durand at New Richmond girl’s basketball game on WRDN in early 1985. There was a small crowd in the gymnasium that night, More Durand fans than the home standing Tigers. Durand was beating New Richmond badly and the ‘Tom and Dave” WRDN broadcast team had lost its intensity in the second half. With Durand up by 30 points we started to play “WIAA school nickname” trivia which was likely more of an audience grabber than a game with such a lopsided score.
Our broadcast location was
just a couple feet from the court. My
mind was more on trivia than the game as there was an inbound play immediately
in front of us. The inbound pass bounced directly off the forehead of New
Richmond player just five feet in front of me.
I called the play ending with the phrase “good head” which some may have
thought as being “off color.” A time out was immediately called and during the
break my wing man, Dave Hoffman, started laughing as he told me what I had
said. The officials wondered what was so funny and Hoffman gave them an
explanation during the time out. We were all laughing hysterically. Our radio
audience never was told the story until now.
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One of my favorite memories
of calling games at WRDN was our drive home following a road game. I’ll admit,
I had a perhaps over inflated ego when working at my hometown radio
station. We were listening to WRDN one
night driving home after calling a game in River Falls. The guy on the air that night starting ridiculing
me repeatedly on the air for the entire time it took us to drive from Ellsworth
to the WRDN studios above Gil Weiss Insurance on Main Street, Durand. The announcer that night had someone joining
him on the radio. One of the exchanges I
remember went something lie this: “He thinks he is so good” If he’s so good why
is he working here in Durand!” (said sarcastically as they both laughed). They went on to rip my daily show on the air.
“Tom thinks he is working on KDWB (most popular Top-40 station in the Twin
Cities). “He calls himself Uncle Tom – what the heck is that? Actually I
adapted the “air name” Uncle Tom as a tribute to my own Uncle Tom Pattison who
had lost his life to cancer.
The announcer in question
left WRDN about a week later. I'm not sure if the door hit him in the butt as he walked out onto Main Street?!
As I look back at my “on air
bashing episode” that night it reminds me of a Donald Trump campaign appearance. I’m not sure where I was in the “polls” at
that point of my professional career
__________________________________________________________________ Coming up next will be some of my maniac moments calling 28 years of UW-Whitewater football and men's basketball games
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