Monthly Archives: March 2012

Women’s NCAA commentators call at slower pace

Leave a reply

BY DANE WINDISCH

The ESPN team of Holly Rowe and Fran Fraschilla were in charge of commentating on the action during the NCAA women’s second round game between Kansas and Delaware. Rowe was the play-by-play commentator and I feel she lacked a presence. Also, there were pauses during the play-by-play, which seemed to delay what she wanted to say. Rowe was lacking in this area of the commentary whereas Fraschilla was very knowledgeable on the main discussion of the game: Delaware’s Center, Elena Della Donna.

When comparing the commentary between a second round game of the men’s tournament to the women’s second round, there are many differences. One example is the number of words used by commentators. In the men’s game, the commentators are consistently using the play-by-play and color analyst through the entire game and using it with great timing. In the women’s game, the commentators just seemed to go at a slower pace with the play-by-play and the color. An explanation for this may be because of the slower play in the women’s game as opposed to the men’s game, but I feel the commentators can keep up regardless of the pace of play.

March Madness: ‘First Four’ Kicks Off Commentary

Leave a reply

BY DANE WINDISCH

The NCAA tournament is the time of year where teams achieve their dream of playing in the “Big Dance” and this game was no different between Lamar and Vermont. TruTv televised the “first four” opening round games and did a fantastic job with its commentary.

Ian Eagle and Jim Spanarkel were the commentators with Lewis Johnson as the on-court reporter giving injury reports and interviewing the coaches before, during, and after the final buzzer. Eagle and Spanarkel did a great job with the play-by-play offering great insight on several set plays executed by both teams. They showed slow motion replays of the play and talked to the viewers about why it was so well executed. When this is done, it gives the viewers a chance to become knowledgeable about the game of basketball.

One of the focuses was on Pat Knight, head coach for Lamar, and how he motivated his team after a Feb. 22 loss by publicly criticizing his seniors about how they are wasting scholarships. A short clip was shown of the press conference and following it there was a comparison of Lamar’s record before the conference then their record after the conference. You could see how well Lamar responded.

This game was just the start of March Madness with more thrilling games to come in the NCAA tournament. One of the big things from these tournaments is the media coverage spanning across four different networks. Each network will bring a different feel to each game and TruTv did a fine job for the Lamar verse Vermont game.