Troy University Athletics
Keeping the Home Fires Burning
10/13/2008 5:00:00 AM | General
Johnny Cash's lyrics cycle in my head from "I've Been Everywhere" but, instead of Reno, Chicago, Fargo, Minnesota, Buffalo, we've been to Columbus, Stillwater, and Fort Lauderdale, before finally returning to Troy for this weekend's game against FIU, and it couldn't come soon enough. One of the many great things about my work with Troy is the travel, but another is the terrific facility we broadcast in for football, and I'm surely ready to be back in the friendly confines of the Gallery, and back into a normal weekly routine.
Monday is, as always, press conference day at Country's Barbecue in town. The difference was that Coach Blakeney was speaking at the lunch meeting of the Birmingham Quarterback Club, so the coordinators --Jeremy Rowell and Neal Brown-- pinch-hit. Both of them are very articulate, and Coach Brown had a good response to my question (partially generated by criticism of the spread offense recently) about the effectiveness of the spread nationwide. Coach Brown saw right through my motives.
Unfortunately, the press conference was also without quarterback Jamie Hampton in attendance for the first time, because of his knee injury last Tuesday. Both Tanner Jones and Levi Brown will battle for the starting job this week, but Tanner has class during the press conference, so Levi sat in with the media and fielded questions, including one about his confidence in his leadership abilities.
After the gathering at Country's, I had to hustle to the stadium to record our gameday feature interview with linebacker Boris Lee, who's had a season statistically superior to last year's at this point. Because Boris is one of the leaders on the team, I have more interaction with him than most, and he's steadily gotten better and more confident with the media. You can hear each week's player feature on our game broadcast about 40 minutes prior to kickoff on the Troy ISP Sports Network.
This Tuesday's Trojan Talk show at Yanni's on Highway 231 will air from 7p-8p Central will also be on the Troy ISP Sports Network, and will feature Coach Larry Blakeney and me talking about the win at FAU and previewing Saturday's home game against surprising FIU. Our call-in number if you have a question or comment for Coach is 1-866-736-5889. The radio broadcast will air on these Troy stations, and online at Yahoo Broadcast. The same stations will carry the game broadcast, and it'll be televised as well by ESPN+, airing locally on WRJM My67 in Troy/Montgomery. As always, email me any questions or thoughts at barry@barrymcknight.com. Thanks, and Go Trojans!
