Re:UMass Sports Networks (WMUA)

[SonnyDaye1@aol.com]

Joe Ross posted the following:
> >        WMUA was carrying UMass sports long before the commercial stations
> >had much interest in doing most of the sports. Even in the late '60s-early
> >'70s, did anyone else do all the men's basketball games, especially before
> >Julius Erving put the school on the map?

>When I started at UMass in 1963, football games were carried by both WMUA
>and WTTT.  WTTT was originating commercially to a network which usually
>included a Boston-area station.  This continued to be the case, except
>that for awhile in the 1980s and 90s, there was no station in the Boston
>area.  I'm not sure when the games went to WHMP, but it was in 1997 that
>they got a Boston-area affiliate again.  That year it was WXKS-AM.  Last
>year and this year, it's been WADN, which is difficult to impossible to
>hear in Boston.
>I remember the first time I went to a game at the old football field
>(where Whitmore Hall is now) and saw the broadcast booth, where, side by
>side, were banners for WMUA and WTTT.<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<

I'll add my two cents. I was one year ahead of Joe at UMass. In 62/63 Jim
Trelease (now a best-selling author of books about reading to children) was
the "Voice Of The Redmen". There was no one but WMUA covering Football or
Basketball up to that point. Then WTTT got in on it. Bob Healey (now City
Manager of Cambridge) was the next play-by-play announcer for WMUA. I was the
engineer for those football games at the "old stadium." I actually had to sit
outside the broadcast booth (sometimes in the rain!) on a ledge with my
portable board. There was only room for the play-by-play announcer, color man,
and spotter inside the booth! 
In the Fall of 65, the next WMUA Voice of The Redmen was my roommate Jeff
Baker (anyone know whatever became of him? I lost contact after he did stints
on WHMP, then WHYN and then was one of the early Jocks at WBCN). I was
Producer/Engineer at the NEW Alumni Stadium during Jeff's tenure. What luxury,
our own 2-level broadcast "suite", and Fred Cusick on the other side of the
glass in the next booth broadcasting for WTTT and I think a station in Boston.
Jeff put together a Redman Sports Network. I remember driving around with Jeff
and signing up stations for the network. WHAI, Greenfield - WBRK, Pittsfield -
and I think 2 others (maybe one in Spgfld). After the basketball season was
over, I remember Jeff selling our Redman Sports Network Banner to Bill
Rasmussen (then a Spgfld TV Sports Announcer) who would need it for a network
he was putting together to carry UMass games in the future. I think a coupla
years after that I heard Bill had started ESPN down in Connecticut.
- -Sonny Daye, WMUA, 1962-1966

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