Chuck Bourg.
For anybody in the NSU athletic department, if there’s a problem, Chuck is usually able to provide a solution. He directs the athletic facilities and equipment and is the ultimate jack of all trades.
Friday afternoon, his trade became telephone repair. After lunch, phone lines serving press row at Prather Coliseum died.
Campus telephone repair man Dale Martin was out of town and his cell phone signal was weak.
All this meant was that the radio broadcasts of the game, both for the Demon Sports Network and Utah State, were kaput.
Except Chuck, and Donna “Momma D” Anderson of the university police office, managed to find the solution. It took some hands-on engineering and also some technical advice from outside, but bottom line is, once again, for the 1,023,377th time, Chuck is our hero!
Friday, November 10, 2006
Tuesday, November 07, 2006
Greeted near The Grove
Several hundred Northwestern fans were at Vaught-Hemingway Stadium in Oxford, Miss., last Saturday to cheer the Demons against the Ole Miss Rebels. No doubt most of them enjoyed tailgating in the fabled Grove, one of the great traditions in college sports.
The Grove is a tree-shrouded area around the stadium where tailgating reaches extravagant levels, complete with fine china under some tents. So I’m told – I had to work and never got out there.
But I was able to bump into a few former Demon football players on the field before the game, and in the stands and even the press box.
Talented tailback Danny Alexander (1991-94), who lives near Oxford and is in the real estate business, brought his nearly teenage daughter and her young friend to the game. They make it back to Natchitoches nearly every year. She was wearing a Demon football camp T-shirt.
Rugged offensive guard Bo Milton (1990-91) brought a buddy to the game. Bo is coaching and his Brookhaven (Miss.) Academy team enters the playoffs with just one loss.
Quarterback and Graduate N Club Hall of Famer Butch Ballard sat with his brothers and nephews in the stands. Butch (1974-75), who sparkled in his debut as color analyst on the Demon Sports Network two weeks ago (not coincidentally, the Demons won!) will be back in the booth for the final two games vs. McNeese and SFA. He made one of the longer trips to Oxford, coming from his home in Huntsville, Texas.
Surely Kent Willoughby wins the honors for the longest trip by a former Demon player to attend Saturday’s game. Willoughby was an end for coach Jack Clayton’s teams, lettering all three years (1960-62) when you could only play three years. He lined up alongside Pro Football Hall of Famer Jackie Smith and other Demon standouts like Corwyn Aldredge Sr.
Willoughby now lives in the Denver area, where he is a ski instructor and a rabid mountain climber. Those are pretty extreme avocations for a fellow who coached football in south Louisiana at Terrebone High School after graduating from Northwestern. He spent 30 years in education, mostly in administration, and was a fascinating guest at halftime on the Demon Sports Network broadcast.
While running through the list of former players, I’m sure I missed a few in Oxford (including the omnipresent combination of David and Stuart Wright, along with Britt Brittain), but two must be mentioned – both also with south Louisiana ties. Of course, that’s Ole Miss head coach Ed “Be-Be” Orgeron and his South Lafourche High School and Demon football buddy, Bryan Arceneaux.
Orgeron lettered on the defensive line from 1980-83, and was voted permanent team captain in 1983, receiving one of the first Joe Delaney Memorial Leadership Awards. He then coached two years under Sam Goodwin.
Arceneaux lettered on the D-line from 1981-84, helping the Demons win the Gulf Star Conference title his senior year, and he also helped coach after his playing days ended.
Both those colorful characters are also still helping the Demons. Orgeron asked Ole Miss to play NSU and give the Demons a two-year contract, resulting in a reported $650,000 lift to the athletic budget over two seasons. Arceneaux hosts the Demon coaching staff each summer on a deep sea fishing expedition out of Grand Isle and is one of Coach Scott Stoker’s close friends and confidantes.
The Grove is a tree-shrouded area around the stadium where tailgating reaches extravagant levels, complete with fine china under some tents. So I’m told – I had to work and never got out there.
But I was able to bump into a few former Demon football players on the field before the game, and in the stands and even the press box.
Talented tailback Danny Alexander (1991-94), who lives near Oxford and is in the real estate business, brought his nearly teenage daughter and her young friend to the game. They make it back to Natchitoches nearly every year. She was wearing a Demon football camp T-shirt.
Rugged offensive guard Bo Milton (1990-91) brought a buddy to the game. Bo is coaching and his Brookhaven (Miss.) Academy team enters the playoffs with just one loss.
Quarterback and Graduate N Club Hall of Famer Butch Ballard sat with his brothers and nephews in the stands. Butch (1974-75), who sparkled in his debut as color analyst on the Demon Sports Network two weeks ago (not coincidentally, the Demons won!) will be back in the booth for the final two games vs. McNeese and SFA. He made one of the longer trips to Oxford, coming from his home in Huntsville, Texas.
Surely Kent Willoughby wins the honors for the longest trip by a former Demon player to attend Saturday’s game. Willoughby was an end for coach Jack Clayton’s teams, lettering all three years (1960-62) when you could only play three years. He lined up alongside Pro Football Hall of Famer Jackie Smith and other Demon standouts like Corwyn Aldredge Sr.
Willoughby now lives in the Denver area, where he is a ski instructor and a rabid mountain climber. Those are pretty extreme avocations for a fellow who coached football in south Louisiana at Terrebone High School after graduating from Northwestern. He spent 30 years in education, mostly in administration, and was a fascinating guest at halftime on the Demon Sports Network broadcast.
While running through the list of former players, I’m sure I missed a few in Oxford (including the omnipresent combination of David and Stuart Wright, along with Britt Brittain), but two must be mentioned – both also with south Louisiana ties. Of course, that’s Ole Miss head coach Ed “Be-Be” Orgeron and his South Lafourche High School and Demon football buddy, Bryan Arceneaux.
Orgeron lettered on the defensive line from 1980-83, and was voted permanent team captain in 1983, receiving one of the first Joe Delaney Memorial Leadership Awards. He then coached two years under Sam Goodwin.
Arceneaux lettered on the D-line from 1981-84, helping the Demons win the Gulf Star Conference title his senior year, and he also helped coach after his playing days ended.
Both those colorful characters are also still helping the Demons. Orgeron asked Ole Miss to play NSU and give the Demons a two-year contract, resulting in a reported $650,000 lift to the athletic budget over two seasons. Arceneaux hosts the Demon coaching staff each summer on a deep sea fishing expedition out of Grand Isle and is one of Coach Scott Stoker’s close friends and confidantes.
Monday, November 06, 2006
The Man Beside the Man Behind the Mic...
Calling football games as the "Voice of the Demons" is a remarkable experience, when (hopefully) thousands of people are hanging on every word, hoping for that key play to win the game. What most people don't understand though, is how much having a good right-hand man means to a quality broadcast.
My right-hand man? David Antilley II: statistician, engineer, yardage calculator, technical guru.
Most people know Davey from his work teaching hordes of young journalism students the ropes in TV. I know Davey because he is the only person I know who beats me to the stadium for the broadcast.
In a typical football broadcast, Davey is responsible for setting up the equipment. Simple, right? A couple of headsets, a mixer and you are good to go? Nope.
Wireless mic, wireless FM modulator, codec box, additional mixer, two headsets, two radio monitors, miles and miles of cords and cables, not to mention my own mini-disc player that I stick him with for pre-game interview and taping the game.
Setting that stuff up takes not only time, but talent, a ridiculous attention to detail and a lot of patience. Davey gets to the booth around three hours before kickoff, if he didn't set the equipment up earlier that morning or the day before, and begins the unpacking process. All of the cords to connect to power, connect the boxes and headsets to each other, connect the wireless mic and receivers in, everything has to be accounted for and arranged.
Only then can he actually hook everything up. By the time he gets done (usually 30 minutes to an hour), he then has to get all of the stat stuff out because Davey also keeps stats during the game and helps me with yardage calculations for long and short gains by the Demons.
Basically, when I walk into the radio booth, I sit down in front of my headset, put it on and start talking. In this setup, I have the easy job.
So the next time you think the broadcast sounds pretty good, or you hear me rattle off someone's stats during the middle of the drive, or wonder how I knew that run was 58 yards by the time the runner is tackled, know that it is Davey Antilley who makes that happen.
Davey is an integral part of the broadcast, giving his time and effort and considerable technical expertise to a job many people don't even know he does. So if you see Davey before the game or around campus, please thank him for a job well done. I always make sure to thank him after every broadcast.
Oh, and did I mention he does this for free??
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