I get the question of what is an SID, probably at least once a month. In this week’s blog I am going to give you a snapshot answer to what an SID is and what they do.
First of all SID stands for sports information director and the short answer is, I am the liaison between our athletic programs and the public.
I guess about six years ago when we became the first Division III school in the country to go with a national sports web site (then it was fans only) now it is CSTV, the web became our number one tool of getting the word out to the public.
I have always sent press releases to the media outlets, both around Abilene and all over the state. I still do that, but it is an almost entirely different process. Before we did it on the fax and to send one press release to the 13 people that get all of our press releases usually took about 30 minutes. Now that is all done in an e-mail group that takes about 30 seconds.
Every since I became the SID at HSU, my number one goal was to update the web site with scores of our games on game day. That was not the norm here, or especially around the ASC. Sometimes it was Monday or Tuesday before weekend games results were posted.
It used to be that all that was on the Internet was the stats, roster and schedule. Now you have to have more information out there. Kids go the web for recruiting; in fact they can know all the need to know about us, before they are ever contacted by a coach.
There are other ways as an SID that I get the word out about our teams. I have a good relationship with the person on our beat at the local newspaper and continually feed them information and story ideas and we also are lucky to have three local television stations that cover us on a regular basis.
Now to what the SID really does. Many people think that we have a job that is just going to games all of the time. That is correct, we go to games all the time, but the games are the fun part of the job. Being able to watch the game is what makes all of the work leading up to a game fun.
Here is a checklist of what the typical SID is:
A writer – I write all of our releases, media guides, game notes and web content
A graphic designer – I design all of our media guides
An editor – not nearly as good as I should be sometimes
A webmaster –I do that for all of the HSU Athletics web site
A game-day administrator – Often times that includes helping with crowd control, but also finding workers for games.
A teacher – I try to teach the game-day students I have working for me to do things the right way.
A statkeeper – Yeah, I keep the stats at most of the games.
A public address announcer – You can hear me at soccer, baseball and softball.
A radio broadcaster – I do games on the road in basketball and baseball.
A photographer – I am not very good at that so I usually arrange to have a photographer.
Promoter – Almost any award that any of our kids receive is done through promotions from this office, it can be filling out weekly player of the week forms, filling out recommendations or sending promotional pieces to voters. Any academic awards, or regional or national awards come straight from this office. You know the game programs you get at a game. Those come from this office as well.
Advertiser – If the school paid for advertising in the paper in the amount of inches of copy that I provide to the paper it would be over $250,000 a year.
Those are some of the broader definitions of what an SID does. People ask me all the time what does it take to get into the profession.
I think the simple answer is the love of what you are doing. If you did not love it, you would burn out in a year. It is amazing the number of people that I have seen just in our conference go in and out of the business in my nine years in the ASC. It doesn’t take long to see the ones that enjoy the job.
You can be the best writer in the world, the best graphic designer or the most organized person in the world, but if you don’t love doing the job, you can’t fake it.
I think the rewarding part is the fact I get to be around college athletes that are good kids every day. My daughter gets to be around those players as role models. It is refreshing when you know the time and amount of effort those kids put into their sport.
If I didn’t get to meet, be around, and work with great people every day; there is no way that I would want to have the job I have. With the relationships that I have formed over the years there is no other job that I would want to have.
Around The Campus
The Cowboys got in the win column in football last week. It got a little too close for comfort at the end, but anyone that saw the first two games and then saw last week has to realize that we are getting better every week and that is all the coaching staff can ask.
Tuesday the Cowgirls were supposed to play ACU in soccer. The game started and HSU held a 1-0 lead before the lightning came in and postponed the game. It has been rescheduled for Oct. 16. The Cowgirls host UT-Tyler and Concordia this weekend at the HSU Soccer Complex.
The Cowboy soccer team went 1-1 last week and is now 3-1 in the very tightly-bunched standings of the ASC. It is another big week for the Cowboys as they host a greatly improved Concordia team and preseason favorite UT-Tyler.
The volleyball team swept three matches last weekend and is off to Mississippi College for the ASC Crossover Tournament this weekend. Kaela Parnell and Sam Lucien were named the ASC West offensive and defensive players of the week.
The tennis teams will host the ITA Tournament this weekend. This is a big tournament for the top individuals as far as playing for a berth in the ITA National Tournament and it also gives momentum heading into the spring season. You can follow the results on the front page of the web site this weekend.
It is now less than three weeks before the basketball teams will begin their practices for the upcoming season. It is hard to believe that we are already into the fifth week of the fall sports schedule.
Thursday, September 27, 2007
Thursday, September 20, 2007
Portland Trip
Like I said in my last blog traveling with the road crew is an adventure and our trip last weekend to Oregon provided some more writing material for the book.
The trip started at Abilene Regional and the first thing I hear when we get there is that our flight had been canceled. That is not a good thing when you are the one that was in charge of the reservations, especially with this crew. At some point our flight had been changed to 9:30 a.m. instead of the 2:30 we had arrived for. Fortunately American was able to get us on to a flight out of Dallas, but it did not leave until 9:15. That meant we had a six-hour layover in Dallas. The good news we got on a direct flight to Portland rather than to San Francisco and then to Portland.
Now how do you kill six hours in the Dallas airport? Fortunately for us John Neese’s girlfriend Melissa Lohnes lives and works close by and she offered to take us to dinner. That was a very nice gesture on her part, the problem was she drives a Pathfinder. Going to the restaurant it was Tim McCarry in the front seat, Al Pickett, Phil Ashby and I in the middle seat and Neese in the area behind the back seat. Neese by far had the most room of the four of us in the back.
After a very nice meal we made a trip to Barnes and Noble to get some reading material. It was only about two blocks, but it had to feel like two hours for Phil, who was stuck in the back seat between Tim and I (if you don’t know us we are two, how do I say this, portly fellows). He says he doesn’t need a chiropractor anymore because everything in his body was popped into place.
Once we finally got back to the airport we had a very uneventful flight. If you are going to have a three and a half hour flight and not be in first class it is always nice to be in the first row of coach with some extra leg room. It happened that is where my seat was. We finally arrived in Portland at about 11:30 PST and we got our rental car and to our hotel at about 12:30.
The next day we get up and around and we are going to look for some lunch. The boys want some seafood (I don’t eat things out of the water) so we type into the Hertz Never Lost system seafood and Tim decides on a place called the Dolphin. We travel to the Dolphin about 10 miles away and pull into the parking lot and see that the Dolphin is not only a seafood place, but also a place for exotic dancers. So we decide to move on down the road. We go to another seafood place that was very nice and they say the seafood was good. I had a club sandwich that was really good. We sat outside and it was about 68 degrees and sunny, a perfect day in Oregon. John, Tim and Phil had a Marionberry (not the former D.C. mayor according to Lexi our waitress) cobbler. Cobbler to them means a pie. Here is a picture of Tim’s pie as we are leaving and Phil’s pie (you decide which is which.)
After the meal we make the trip over to McMinnville. It was a very nice area and the whole countryside is covered with nurseries, wineries and about every type of crop you can imagine. We make our way to a space museum and I am not one that is awed by museums that much, but the Spruce Goose was an amazing site. I have attached video and a picture of the amazing plane that is wider than a football field. It was a great learning experience about something I had very limited knowledge. Here is a not very good picture from inside the big bird.
We then checked out the McMinnville downtown and headed over to the football field. It is a nice old downtown area. The campus is a big campus for the size of school and what amazes me about the whole area is the number of hanging plants. There are hanging from about every pole in town. After scoping out the campus, we headed back to the hotel. It was 34 miles and took us just over an hour. Needless to say it is not like driving to Alpine.
We were in a hurry to get back to the hotel to see my alma mater Oklahoma State play Troy in football. It was not a pretty game to watch. It was the most embarrassing loss since I have been a Cowboy fan. They didn’t lose to the Men of Troy or even to Troy Aikman, they lost to Troy for crying out loud. I did feel the need to text Zach Pickelman during the game and tell him that his Michigan team is not the worst team in a power conference in America. I think my Cowboys have that covered. This could be the year for Baylor, oh wait it can’t get that bad can it.
After the game was over it was time for bed. Normally I am not out cold by 10 o’clock, but I think the travel and time difference caught up with me. On Saturday when we woke up it was a great day outside. It was probably in the low 50’s and it had the crisp fall feel. We went to McMinnville and had breakfast (without the s), walked around downtown and headed to the game.
The game was quite entertaining if you like offense. Linfield is a unique place and their stadium was originally built in the 1920’s. It had covered seating on the home side and it turned out to be a great day for football. The Cowboys fought hard, but could not keep the Wildcats off the scoreboard and for the first time since the first year of the Jimmie Keeling era the Cowboys have lost the first two games of the season.
On Saturday night we headed into Portland for a nice meal at another seafood place. It was right on the river and in the middle of the entertainment district. We had to be at the airport by 5:30 a.m. so it was a short night and we made it home rather uneventfully on Sunday.
Other happenings from around the HSU campus this week
Congrats to the soccer teams for starting 2-0 in conference play. The men won their first two games of the year and both were one-goal games. Jorge Vega scored three goals and the young Cowboys proved the will be a force to be reckoned with in the ASC this year.
It was disappointing to hear that All-American Amy Kuykendall tore her ACL against Texas Lutheran. She is really a phenomenal player. It will definitely hurt the Cowgirls offensively, but if there is one coach that I think can lose his best player and All-American and still come out with results it is Marcus Wood. He beat a No. 1 Trinity team a few years ago with basically nine healthy bodies in the NCAA Tournament. He has proven year in and year out he can make adjustments on his team and keep them in the upper echelon of the teams in the NCAA Tournament. We hope for a speedy recovery for Amy.
The volleyball team went 2-0 last weekend and then last night beat a previously unbeaten team in McMurry to move to 3-0 in conference action. It was the home debut for Sabrina Bingham and there was a great crowd on hand.
The Cowgirl tennis team won five singles flights and two doubles flights at the ASC Individual Tournament. The Cowboys won flight one doubles and flight nine singles. HSU has won seven straight ASC women’s titles and six in a row for the men.
The women’s golf team beat five other ASC schools to win the UT-Dallas Invitational in their first tournament of the year. Freshman Ashley Luecke won the individual title by 11 strokes. Congrats to the Cowgirls.
The trip started at Abilene Regional and the first thing I hear when we get there is that our flight had been canceled. That is not a good thing when you are the one that was in charge of the reservations, especially with this crew. At some point our flight had been changed to 9:30 a.m. instead of the 2:30 we had arrived for. Fortunately American was able to get us on to a flight out of Dallas, but it did not leave until 9:15. That meant we had a six-hour layover in Dallas. The good news we got on a direct flight to Portland rather than to San Francisco and then to Portland.
Now how do you kill six hours in the Dallas airport? Fortunately for us John Neese’s girlfriend Melissa Lohnes lives and works close by and she offered to take us to dinner. That was a very nice gesture on her part, the problem was she drives a Pathfinder. Going to the restaurant it was Tim McCarry in the front seat, Al Pickett, Phil Ashby and I in the middle seat and Neese in the area behind the back seat. Neese by far had the most room of the four of us in the back.
After a very nice meal we made a trip to Barnes and Noble to get some reading material. It was only about two blocks, but it had to feel like two hours for Phil, who was stuck in the back seat between Tim and I (if you don’t know us we are two, how do I say this, portly fellows). He says he doesn’t need a chiropractor anymore because everything in his body was popped into place.
Once we finally got back to the airport we had a very uneventful flight. If you are going to have a three and a half hour flight and not be in first class it is always nice to be in the first row of coach with some extra leg room. It happened that is where my seat was. We finally arrived in Portland at about 11:30 PST and we got our rental car and to our hotel at about 12:30.
The next day we get up and around and we are going to look for some lunch. The boys want some seafood (I don’t eat things out of the water) so we type into the Hertz Never Lost system seafood and Tim decides on a place called the Dolphin. We travel to the Dolphin about 10 miles away and pull into the parking lot and see that the Dolphin is not only a seafood place, but also a place for exotic dancers. So we decide to move on down the road. We go to another seafood place that was very nice and they say the seafood was good. I had a club sandwich that was really good. We sat outside and it was about 68 degrees and sunny, a perfect day in Oregon. John, Tim and Phil had a Marionberry (not the former D.C. mayor according to Lexi our waitress) cobbler. Cobbler to them means a pie. Here is a picture of Tim’s pie as we are leaving and Phil’s pie (you decide which is which.)
After the meal we make the trip over to McMinnville. It was a very nice area and the whole countryside is covered with nurseries, wineries and about every type of crop you can imagine. We make our way to a space museum and I am not one that is awed by museums that much, but the Spruce Goose was an amazing site. I have attached video and a picture of the amazing plane that is wider than a football field. It was a great learning experience about something I had very limited knowledge. Here is a not very good picture from inside the big bird.
We then checked out the McMinnville downtown and headed over to the football field. It is a nice old downtown area. The campus is a big campus for the size of school and what amazes me about the whole area is the number of hanging plants. There are hanging from about every pole in town. After scoping out the campus, we headed back to the hotel. It was 34 miles and took us just over an hour. Needless to say it is not like driving to Alpine.
We were in a hurry to get back to the hotel to see my alma mater Oklahoma State play Troy in football. It was not a pretty game to watch. It was the most embarrassing loss since I have been a Cowboy fan. They didn’t lose to the Men of Troy or even to Troy Aikman, they lost to Troy for crying out loud. I did feel the need to text Zach Pickelman during the game and tell him that his Michigan team is not the worst team in a power conference in America. I think my Cowboys have that covered. This could be the year for Baylor, oh wait it can’t get that bad can it.
After the game was over it was time for bed. Normally I am not out cold by 10 o’clock, but I think the travel and time difference caught up with me. On Saturday when we woke up it was a great day outside. It was probably in the low 50’s and it had the crisp fall feel. We went to McMinnville and had breakfast (without the s), walked around downtown and headed to the game.
The game was quite entertaining if you like offense. Linfield is a unique place and their stadium was originally built in the 1920’s. It had covered seating on the home side and it turned out to be a great day for football. The Cowboys fought hard, but could not keep the Wildcats off the scoreboard and for the first time since the first year of the Jimmie Keeling era the Cowboys have lost the first two games of the season.
On Saturday night we headed into Portland for a nice meal at another seafood place. It was right on the river and in the middle of the entertainment district. We had to be at the airport by 5:30 a.m. so it was a short night and we made it home rather uneventfully on Sunday.
Other happenings from around the HSU campus this week
Congrats to the soccer teams for starting 2-0 in conference play. The men won their first two games of the year and both were one-goal games. Jorge Vega scored three goals and the young Cowboys proved the will be a force to be reckoned with in the ASC this year.
It was disappointing to hear that All-American Amy Kuykendall tore her ACL against Texas Lutheran. She is really a phenomenal player. It will definitely hurt the Cowgirls offensively, but if there is one coach that I think can lose his best player and All-American and still come out with results it is Marcus Wood. He beat a No. 1 Trinity team a few years ago with basically nine healthy bodies in the NCAA Tournament. He has proven year in and year out he can make adjustments on his team and keep them in the upper echelon of the teams in the NCAA Tournament. We hope for a speedy recovery for Amy.
The volleyball team went 2-0 last weekend and then last night beat a previously unbeaten team in McMurry to move to 3-0 in conference action. It was the home debut for Sabrina Bingham and there was a great crowd on hand.
The Cowgirl tennis team won five singles flights and two doubles flights at the ASC Individual Tournament. The Cowboys won flight one doubles and flight nine singles. HSU has won seven straight ASC women’s titles and six in a row for the men.
The women’s golf team beat five other ASC schools to win the UT-Dallas Invitational in their first tournament of the year. Freshman Ashley Luecke won the individual title by 11 strokes. Congrats to the Cowgirls.
Tuesday, September 11, 2007
Go West Young Man
I have gotten several responses on the blog and that lets me know people are reading. I have even had a couple of colleagues in the conference ask about it and they seem to be interested in writing their own blog for their schools.
It has been a whirlwind first two weeks to the school year and their have been some interesting results from our events so far. As conference play begins this weekend one thing has become very apparent. Last year we were so lucky to have senior-laden teams in a lot of our fall sports. We graduated some players a year ago that will no doubt be future Hall of Famers at HSU in several sports. From a quick count off the top of my head we had at least eight seniors from a year ago that are no doubters, they had that big of an impact on the school and their teams.
When that type of leadership is gone, you have to find new leaders and players have to step into new roles. That has been the case in several sports this season. Coaches use the non-conference schedule to get their teams ready for conference play and to make whatever adjustments are necessary.
I am totally confident in all of our coaches to adjust their teams around their personnel. All four fall sport teams lost players that were not only great players and leaders, but all four lost some players that were starters from the time they stepped on campus. That is the fun part about their job is to take a team and try to make it better from the start of preseason training all the way to the end of the year. Our coaches have excelled at doing that and I am sure they will again.
The men's soccer team has two seniors, one junior and the rest are freshmen and sophomores. There is a lot of talent on the team but it is young and will take time to develop. They are looking for an identity after graduating their top two scorers from a year.
The same thing is true on the football team. The defense lost eight starters from a year ago and the offense lost six starters. That is a lot of experience and talent to replace. It will take some time for those leaders to develop. It is a nice luxury to have guys that have started 20 or more games to lead a team like the Cowboys had last year.
The women's soccer team seems to be in the same situation. The Cowgirls had some strong leaders that were seniors last year. The team has a lot of talent returning, but when you talk about losing three seniors that started basically every game of their careers and two more that played key roles throughout their career and players have always looked to them for guidance there is going to be some bumpy spots. Different players are having to step into that role this year.
Volleyball lost maybe the best player to ever play for HSU in Virginia Aguilar and Holly Amerena was a solid floor leader. The Cowgirls have had to replace them and also have had to adjust to a new coach. That takes some immediate adjustments on their part as well. If you haven't noticed the Cowgirls have played a brutal non-conference schedule and are 3-4. They have played four teams that went to the national tournament a year ago. The Cowgirls played No. 7 Trinity tough, winning a game from them for the first time. HSU lost in five games to No. 22 Pacific Lutheran. They seem primed to start conference play.
All four teams are talented and all four will compete for the conference titles. It may take some time, but that is what makes athletics fun, seeing the teams develop over the year.
Another of the favorite parts of my job is the time I get to spend traveling with our teams. It is so nice to get them away from Abilene and see different parts of the country. It is also nice to see how our kids act when we go on the road. They are polite, respectful and most of the time are business-like in their approach to the trip. You really get to know players and teams a lot better when you get on the road with them for a few days.
I have traveled all over the United States with our teams and it is a learning experience each time. For as long as I have been at HSU, we have basically been known as the Road Crew. Some people have gone in and some have gone out, but basically it is athletic director John Neese, facilities director Tim McCarry, myself and then radio announcers Phil Ashby and Al Pickett. John, Tim and I have been on all of these trips over the years and it really is a fun experience to travel with this group.
There are so many stories that we should probably write a book some day, but then again no one would believe it. So we are off on another journey this weekend to the Great Northwest. It will be our first trip to Portland.
It has been a whirlwind first two weeks to the school year and their have been some interesting results from our events so far. As conference play begins this weekend one thing has become very apparent. Last year we were so lucky to have senior-laden teams in a lot of our fall sports. We graduated some players a year ago that will no doubt be future Hall of Famers at HSU in several sports. From a quick count off the top of my head we had at least eight seniors from a year ago that are no doubters, they had that big of an impact on the school and their teams.
When that type of leadership is gone, you have to find new leaders and players have to step into new roles. That has been the case in several sports this season. Coaches use the non-conference schedule to get their teams ready for conference play and to make whatever adjustments are necessary.
I am totally confident in all of our coaches to adjust their teams around their personnel. All four fall sport teams lost players that were not only great players and leaders, but all four lost some players that were starters from the time they stepped on campus. That is the fun part about their job is to take a team and try to make it better from the start of preseason training all the way to the end of the year. Our coaches have excelled at doing that and I am sure they will again.
The men's soccer team has two seniors, one junior and the rest are freshmen and sophomores. There is a lot of talent on the team but it is young and will take time to develop. They are looking for an identity after graduating their top two scorers from a year.
The same thing is true on the football team. The defense lost eight starters from a year ago and the offense lost six starters. That is a lot of experience and talent to replace. It will take some time for those leaders to develop. It is a nice luxury to have guys that have started 20 or more games to lead a team like the Cowboys had last year.
The women's soccer team seems to be in the same situation. The Cowgirls had some strong leaders that were seniors last year. The team has a lot of talent returning, but when you talk about losing three seniors that started basically every game of their careers and two more that played key roles throughout their career and players have always looked to them for guidance there is going to be some bumpy spots. Different players are having to step into that role this year.
Volleyball lost maybe the best player to ever play for HSU in Virginia Aguilar and Holly Amerena was a solid floor leader. The Cowgirls have had to replace them and also have had to adjust to a new coach. That takes some immediate adjustments on their part as well. If you haven't noticed the Cowgirls have played a brutal non-conference schedule and are 3-4. They have played four teams that went to the national tournament a year ago. The Cowgirls played No. 7 Trinity tough, winning a game from them for the first time. HSU lost in five games to No. 22 Pacific Lutheran. They seem primed to start conference play.
All four teams are talented and all four will compete for the conference titles. It may take some time, but that is what makes athletics fun, seeing the teams develop over the year.
Another of the favorite parts of my job is the time I get to spend traveling with our teams. It is so nice to get them away from Abilene and see different parts of the country. It is also nice to see how our kids act when we go on the road. They are polite, respectful and most of the time are business-like in their approach to the trip. You really get to know players and teams a lot better when you get on the road with them for a few days.
I have traveled all over the United States with our teams and it is a learning experience each time. For as long as I have been at HSU, we have basically been known as the Road Crew. Some people have gone in and some have gone out, but basically it is athletic director John Neese, facilities director Tim McCarry, myself and then radio announcers Phil Ashby and Al Pickett. John, Tim and I have been on all of these trips over the years and it really is a fun experience to travel with this group.
There are so many stories that we should probably write a book some day, but then again no one would believe it. So we are off on another journey this weekend to the Great Northwest. It will be our first trip to Portland.
Thursday, September 6, 2007
The Calm Before the Storm
It has been a quiet week around here so far and fortunately for the most part it will stay that way as we do not have a home event (other than a tennis tournament that is hosted all over town) this weekend. That is very rare for the fall. Also, with it being an off week for football the load has been lighter around here.
Monday's soccer game with the College of the Southwest was canceled, because the Mustangs lost too many players in a 14-0 loss to ACU on Sunday. It could have been another ugly score had they played.
Senior defender Laura Newbrough was named the ASC Soccer Defensive Player of the Week and also earned a spot on the D3kicks.com national team of the week. She was the first HSU player to be named ASC Player of the Week this season. HSU routinely leads the league in players of the week for the season.
Congrats to volleyball coach Sabrina Bingham on her first career win at HSU, a 3-0 blanking of Fontbonne on Saturday.
Another congratulations goes out to HSU football coach Jared Sanderson and his wife on the birth of their son Colt. He came in at over 9 pounds and everyone is doing well.
Monday's soccer game with the College of the Southwest was canceled, because the Mustangs lost too many players in a 14-0 loss to ACU on Sunday. It could have been another ugly score had they played.
Senior defender Laura Newbrough was named the ASC Soccer Defensive Player of the Week and also earned a spot on the D3kicks.com national team of the week. She was the first HSU player to be named ASC Player of the Week this season. HSU routinely leads the league in players of the week for the season.
Congrats to volleyball coach Sabrina Bingham on her first career win at HSU, a 3-0 blanking of Fontbonne on Saturday.
Another congratulations goes out to HSU football coach Jared Sanderson and his wife on the birth of their son Colt. He came in at over 9 pounds and everyone is doing well.
Monday, September 3, 2007
Whew - What A Weekend
Well the first weekend of games has come and gone and it is amazing every year you think you are ready and then it gets here and there are a 100 little things that you didn't get done in preparing for the season.
The Cowgirl Soccer team opened the season with a big win over Trinity in the first home contest of the year. It was the first time the Cowgirls have defeated Trinity in the regular season. HSU then went on the road Saturday to defeat Southwestern, 2-1. HSU tied both teams a year ago in the opening weekend.
On Friday, the Cowgirl volleyball team was beginning the Sabrina Bingham era at the UT-Dallas Tournament. HSU dropped its two matches on Friday, but returned with two big wins on Saturday to go 2-2.
Saturday was a crazy day. After setting up the press box and getting ready for the football game, I went over to the soccer field for the first game of the men's soccer season. They lost 2-0 to UTPB, but showed some promise for the season.
I rushed over to football to get ready for the game. Anyone that knows me, knows I am a technology junkie. One of the things I have done in the past is have livestats in front of the radio guys via linked computer. I have to borrow a laptop from technology services and it is linked via the network to the computer where the game stats are kept and they see the stats as they are updated. I received a new computer this summer and I did not have a program installed on it to connect the computers so that was the first thing that went wrong.
Then the game started and UWL had an amazing first half, although we seemd to gather some momentum toward the end of the half. When I went to print the stats for halftime, my printer I have been using for seven years now decided it was time for it to retire. So I was without a printer in the press box.
Well I took a deep breath and got ready for the second half, right as it is about to start the radio guys come in and say that the Internet stream was making a horrible high=pitched noise. There is nothing worse than that for a listener on the other end. I called the company that streams our games and don't get a response.
The reason was they had a system failure and they were down. They finally got the problem fixed about 11:30, but unfortunately (or fortunately depending on how you look at it) our listeners did not get to hear the second half.
We have been working with Stretch Internet off and one for about four years now and I will go to bat for them, they have always been a great solution for us on the streaming side. They still are, they just had some problems that were out of their control. I know it was frustrating for some of our listeners and without us being on the radio this season it is the only option. Stick with us, I think it will eventually be a great solution for us and we will be streaming more games in more sports than ever.
Again we apologize for the problems and we stand behind Stretch.
Now to the second half of the football game, we got the ball first and immediately came down and scored and then got a three and out and was driving again before stalling out. From then on out UWL played great and they got the victory.
This is my eighth season at HSU and personally I think that is the best team we have faced in that time, including the 2000 year when we went to the semifinals. UWL is a very good team and we will be too. When you are starting new players all over the field it will take some time, unfortunately for the Cowboys they did not have that time before Saturday. The young guys were immediately thrown to the fire against a very good team.
One of the things that the weekend brought was a look at the updated Game Tracker. Our Internet provider CSTV, has really upgraded the Gametracker and have integrated features such as showing a player's picture when they are involved in a play. It is really a neat feature and if you have never had the opportunity to watch Gametracker on the Internet it is a nice touch, especially when the stream went down.
If you have ever wondered what it is like after a game - let me tell you it is a hectic couple of hours around here. Immediately after the game I come right over to my office and we print out what we call the books. It has all of the stats, play-by-play, etc from the game. We give those to the media covering the game and 10 to each team.
For a night game, I immediately send out an e-mail with the boxscore of the game to a prearranged media list. That way they can get the scores and the basics of the game. I also have a fax group send set up that goes to our opponents' media that are not on the e-mail list.
After that I update the web site with a box score and up-dated stats. This past Saturday was another challenge because we had men's and women's soccer and volleyball. I was able to update the men's soccer stats before the football game and volleyball and women's soccer finished up their games about the time the football game started.
I updated their stats on the web so at least the scores were on the web. At this point it was about 9:45 and the deadline for the ARN is 10:20 on Saturday so I need to have it to them by about 10 on Saturday's. I banged out a quick recap of all four contests (two volleyball and men's and women's soccer) and sent that out to the media list. Since the paper staffed the football game it was least imperative that I write that story before deadline so I wrote the football story after that. I then put the stories up on the HSU site and they were all on the web site with photo galleries for football and men's soccer by 10:45.
After that I followed up on a few e-mails about the stream being down and I updated the HSU pages on D3Football and D3kicks web sites. I also vote on a national poll for football so I checked the national scoreboard and prepared my ballot that is due on Sunday mornings. I finally walked out the door at about 12:30. I was back in the office by noon on Sunday. That is the day I work on players of the week nominations, do game notes for football and get ready for, what by our standards is, a light week in the fall.
I pride myself on getting the most information on our web site the fastest on game day. If at all possible there are results and updated stats of events the day of games on our site. If it is not updated, there has been a problem. If you notice something amiss on the site, please don't hesitate to drop me an e-mail. I am getting closer to having all of the rosters on the web for this year and all of the schedules are up.
The Cowgirl Soccer team opened the season with a big win over Trinity in the first home contest of the year. It was the first time the Cowgirls have defeated Trinity in the regular season. HSU then went on the road Saturday to defeat Southwestern, 2-1. HSU tied both teams a year ago in the opening weekend.
On Friday, the Cowgirl volleyball team was beginning the Sabrina Bingham era at the UT-Dallas Tournament. HSU dropped its two matches on Friday, but returned with two big wins on Saturday to go 2-2.
Saturday was a crazy day. After setting up the press box and getting ready for the football game, I went over to the soccer field for the first game of the men's soccer season. They lost 2-0 to UTPB, but showed some promise for the season.
I rushed over to football to get ready for the game. Anyone that knows me, knows I am a technology junkie. One of the things I have done in the past is have livestats in front of the radio guys via linked computer. I have to borrow a laptop from technology services and it is linked via the network to the computer where the game stats are kept and they see the stats as they are updated. I received a new computer this summer and I did not have a program installed on it to connect the computers so that was the first thing that went wrong.
Then the game started and UWL had an amazing first half, although we seemd to gather some momentum toward the end of the half. When I went to print the stats for halftime, my printer I have been using for seven years now decided it was time for it to retire. So I was without a printer in the press box.
Well I took a deep breath and got ready for the second half, right as it is about to start the radio guys come in and say that the Internet stream was making a horrible high=pitched noise. There is nothing worse than that for a listener on the other end. I called the company that streams our games and don't get a response.
The reason was they had a system failure and they were down. They finally got the problem fixed about 11:30, but unfortunately (or fortunately depending on how you look at it) our listeners did not get to hear the second half.
We have been working with Stretch Internet off and one for about four years now and I will go to bat for them, they have always been a great solution for us on the streaming side. They still are, they just had some problems that were out of their control. I know it was frustrating for some of our listeners and without us being on the radio this season it is the only option. Stick with us, I think it will eventually be a great solution for us and we will be streaming more games in more sports than ever.
Again we apologize for the problems and we stand behind Stretch.
Now to the second half of the football game, we got the ball first and immediately came down and scored and then got a three and out and was driving again before stalling out. From then on out UWL played great and they got the victory.
This is my eighth season at HSU and personally I think that is the best team we have faced in that time, including the 2000 year when we went to the semifinals. UWL is a very good team and we will be too. When you are starting new players all over the field it will take some time, unfortunately for the Cowboys they did not have that time before Saturday. The young guys were immediately thrown to the fire against a very good team.
One of the things that the weekend brought was a look at the updated Game Tracker. Our Internet provider CSTV, has really upgraded the Gametracker and have integrated features such as showing a player's picture when they are involved in a play. It is really a neat feature and if you have never had the opportunity to watch Gametracker on the Internet it is a nice touch, especially when the stream went down.
If you have ever wondered what it is like after a game - let me tell you it is a hectic couple of hours around here. Immediately after the game I come right over to my office and we print out what we call the books. It has all of the stats, play-by-play, etc from the game. We give those to the media covering the game and 10 to each team.
For a night game, I immediately send out an e-mail with the boxscore of the game to a prearranged media list. That way they can get the scores and the basics of the game. I also have a fax group send set up that goes to our opponents' media that are not on the e-mail list.
After that I update the web site with a box score and up-dated stats. This past Saturday was another challenge because we had men's and women's soccer and volleyball. I was able to update the men's soccer stats before the football game and volleyball and women's soccer finished up their games about the time the football game started.
I updated their stats on the web so at least the scores were on the web. At this point it was about 9:45 and the deadline for the ARN is 10:20 on Saturday so I need to have it to them by about 10 on Saturday's. I banged out a quick recap of all four contests (two volleyball and men's and women's soccer) and sent that out to the media list. Since the paper staffed the football game it was least imperative that I write that story before deadline so I wrote the football story after that. I then put the stories up on the HSU site and they were all on the web site with photo galleries for football and men's soccer by 10:45.
After that I followed up on a few e-mails about the stream being down and I updated the HSU pages on D3Football and D3kicks web sites. I also vote on a national poll for football so I checked the national scoreboard and prepared my ballot that is due on Sunday mornings. I finally walked out the door at about 12:30. I was back in the office by noon on Sunday. That is the day I work on players of the week nominations, do game notes for football and get ready for, what by our standards is, a light week in the fall.
I pride myself on getting the most information on our web site the fastest on game day. If at all possible there are results and updated stats of events the day of games on our site. If it is not updated, there has been a problem. If you notice something amiss on the site, please don't hesitate to drop me an e-mail. I am getting closer to having all of the rosters on the web for this year and all of the schedules are up.
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