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Post by DOOMS on Sept 25, 2006 8:00:46 GMT -5
Is that why we're taking the bus to Cookman?
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Post by Bornthrilla on Sept 25, 2006 8:56:31 GMT -5
Big Boy, do you mean that the athletic department has stopped paying for the travel of the radio broadcast team or the travel of the actual football team? Please tell me it is not the latter.
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Post by TOPPDOGG on Sept 25, 2006 8:56:38 GMT -5
We're flying to Cookman, but yes we're still broke as hell.
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Post by Aggie One on Sept 25, 2006 14:13:20 GMT -5
Yeah the team is flying down. Everyone else will have to hoof it down the highway.
As far as the broadcast team is concerned, the Scandrett experiment was always on tape delay the day after the game which I never understood so you really didn't get any benefit of a play by play from it although it was well done when I heard it. The real time student broadcast was extremely amatuerish and weak on 90.1. There was a big stink raised by the old timers to bring Mel and Spence back after listening to those scrubs that year and I really couldn't blame them.
If the university does decide to keep them around which they probably will until someone wheels one of them out feet first, I do wish they would get a better spotter because they consistently lose track of the down, the field markers, and player's names over and over and over again.
Covington's commentary is all cliches and totally pointless in the booth.
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Post by AggiePride on Sept 25, 2006 21:10:12 GMT -5
Dooms, got me thinking we are the next PVAMU...
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Post by DOOMS on Sept 26, 2006 8:31:48 GMT -5
Let's see...
Men's basketball has not had a winning season since I don't know when and was dead last a few years ago. Haven't even won ten games.
Women's basketball, same deal.
Football is 6-19 over the past 2+ years with no signs of improvement this year.
Maybe not Prarie View, but we are pretty low right now.
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Post by Bigboy on Sept 26, 2006 12:26:30 GMT -5
Thrilla, I was talking about the broadcast team not the football team.
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Post by Bornthrilla on Oct 6, 2006 15:50:21 GMT -5
Gwynn and Swann: A&T’s odd couple on WNAA 90.1 by Darrick Ignasiak
October 04, 2006
With a four-year playing career and 43 years of play-by-play commentating, A&T football has been Spencer Gwynn’s passion for the past 47 years.
Gwynn has covered over 500 games and possibly has seen more A&T football than any other person alive. Gwynn, a retired education administrator of 29 years, does not plan on stopping anytime soon.
“When we love what we do, its hard to see yourself not doing it,” said wife Eleanor Gwynn, who is the chairwoman of Visual and Peforming Arts. “As long as his voice holds up, I think he will do it.”
A&T football games are now broadcasted over 90.1 FM, but it originally was 1510 WEAL AM in 1963. Gwynn was not happy with the broadcast that h had heard over thanksgiving of 1962, so he decided to give it a try. Currently in his second year of teaching here in Greensboro at Joseph Price Middle School, Gwynn started broadcasting.
“They had a lot of guys on there who were like comedians and so we weren’t listening with a lot of pride, said Gwynn, who was inducted into the A&T sports hall-of-fame in 1997 and has held the record for the longest punt of 76 yards. “We would listen for the entertainment.”
Mel Swann, a Hampton Institute graduate and honorary Aggie, has been along side Gwynn calling games for 30 years. Billy Covington has been with them for the past six.
“I had a pretty good working knowledge of football,” said Swann, an education administrator for 36 years. “For a long time it was just the two of us, then the station added another person. A few years back we transferred to the campus radio station.”
Swann and Gwynn worked together as teachers at Joseph Price. That is where Gwynn asked Swann to join him in the booth.
“Him and Mel have been friends for a long time,” Eleanor Gwynn said. “They are like the odd couple. They have their moments. They are funny.”
Gwynn was a punter, running back and linebacker for the Aggies before putting on the headset. He couldn’t stay away from his stomping grounds at Memorial Stadium, which was A&T’s previous stadium before Aggie stadium.
“Going back and forth to work everyday,” Gwynn said. “I would hear on the radio that they would broadcast A&T football games. I kept thinking and thought I would like to do that because I played football at A&T.
“So I thought I could parlay that knowledge and do better than those guys cracking jokes,” he said.
Gwynn called the WEAL’s station manager and what was going to be a 15-minute interview turned into four hours. The rest is history. His knowledge of A&T football put him over the top.
Gwynn currently does play-by-play on air, but in his first game at Fort Eustice, he did play by play. He excelled quickly.
”The announcers and sports writers for the base were asking technical questions in which they did not have the answer and they referred them to me since I played football,” he said. “I answered the questions and then they sent me to the stadium. They got embarrassed and then they let me do the play by play. It was all a big joke. They weren’t serious people about doing it.”
Gwynn said the biggest challenge is preparation. Covington, Gwynn and Swann spend hours during the week preparing for games.
“It has been a pleasure working with the guys,” said Covington. “They are quite knowledgeable of the game. We are welcomed every where we go with open arms.”
They attend press conferences, go to practices, read over any newspaper they can get their hands on and arrive at games a day early if they are on the road.
“Play by play is difficult,” Swann said. “You have to follow the ball and you have to have some knowledge of formations and a great knowledge of the game.”
“I try to follow him with some additional observation that I may have and add some color to the broadcast,” he said.
In addition to football, Gwynn and Swann have covered basketball games together.
“For about eight seasons, we did the full basketball schedule for another commercial radio station that was in town called WBIG,” Gwynn said.
Gwynn is a perfectionist on and off the air. While he is on the road covering games, he is the first one to go into the hotel rooms and make sure everything is in order.
“He is a perfectionist and that is his biggest fault,” Eleanor Gwynn said.
“The thing about being on the air is I try to do it in a fashion where I’m believable,” said Gwynn. “People have to trust the announcer because we paint the picture. We want them to see the game through the picture we paint.
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Post by JeffAggieFan on Oct 6, 2006 15:56:59 GMT -5
What happened to the internet brodcast. You can't pick up wnaa anymore
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Maxell
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Post by Maxell on Oct 6, 2006 16:17:32 GMT -5
What happened to the internet brodcast. You can't pick up wnaa anymore Yes you can. I listen every week. GO to www.ncat.edu, Click on Popular Sites, then Aggie Radio, then Listen Live.
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Post by AggieMike on Oct 6, 2006 19:22:27 GMT -5
Yo! I'm proud to say that if you go to the A&T homepage during the game there will be a link to the video feed with me and my boy Justin Howard broadcasting all the action, now we're to Madden & Michaels but I think we give Spence and the Handsome one a run for their money...lol"
Home games only though
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Post by Bornthrilla on Oct 14, 2006 14:22:24 GMT -5
I don't care how many budget problems we have, we've got to get an new play-by-play person to do our radio broadcast next season. It is completely unbearable now. You can keep Mel if he wants to do the color analysis for free, but Spencer has got to be told to retire. Let him finish out the season, give him a going away ceremony ... and then peace out.
Billy Covington sounds like he is chewing on a mouth full of rocks. I would put a restraining order out on him, preventing him from coming within 100 yards of a radio booth.
If we are going to improve our athletic department this would be a good place to start.
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Post by antfan2003 on Oct 14, 2006 19:53:50 GMT -5
Ill drink to that !!!! But i dont think its gonna happen. Too much political BS to deal with if you try to fire a board member and a hall of famer... They are a HOT MESS though... thats for sure.. I heard Billy say the word "RETROGRESSING" today.. and i know he was meaning to say regressing.. WHAT THE?
I honestly dont think that they realized that its NOT THEIR PLACE to criticize the coaches decisions and to talk about how bad the effort is/was on a particular play. Thats totally outta control...
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Post by bluehaze on Oct 16, 2006 7:50:46 GMT -5
I honestly dont think that they realized that its NOT THEIR PLACE to criticize the coaches decisions and to talk about how bad the effort is/was on a particular play. Thats totally outta control... Then who should? The announcers should be unbiased and when you are giving up 40 every game, there is alot to criticize.
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Post by Aggie Monster on Oct 16, 2006 8:41:43 GMT -5
I listened to the Del state broadcast. 2 Younger guys, sounded like they were in there late 20s. They never bad mouthed A&T the entire broadcast. They were unbiased as you could get with a beat down like that. They sounded like they couldn't believe that A&T was this bad now.
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