ESPNU's Mike Hall caught up ...
Campus Crawl: Inner circle
The Campus Crawl heads west ...
Campus Crawl: Lowe down
ESPNU's Mike Hall catches up ...
Campus Crawl: Re-Lax
ESPNU's Mike Hall catches up ...
Welcome inside espnU.com. Hi, I’m Mike Hall, your host for espnU. It has been wild and crazy starting up our network here. And throughout it all, its really been a blast. Our basic idea was to make this a place where you could go to get a reminder of what most people consider the ‘best years of their life’, by going back to college. We want to bring the energy, the enthusiasm, the excitement of the college scene in everything we do. And that of course means, this venue as much as Any in the sports world, should be Fun! So far, that’s exactly what we’ve had. Glad you are along for the ride. Let me take you through some of the best moments from the first month and a half.
In case you didn’t see the promo (sarcasm) it all started on 03-04-05. Twas a wonderful night in Stillwater, Oklahoma with tremendous weather the whole time we were there. Far and away one of the best days of my life. How was the campus? Well, the thing is, I think it’s the People more than the buildings and trees that make any campus great. And by that standard Oklahoma State is a phenomenal campus. We met some tremendous people at every turn, which really helped make the experience so memorable.
Our launch evening "ended" by signing off air to Three Doors Down singing ‘Let Me Go.’ But there really was no end in sight. After that song, as espn2 signed off and espnU went to our studio to start our first live game… the band played for another hour or so inside Gallager-Iba. Afterwards we were able to meet the band- and they were great. Their drummer’s a big sporto. Then, we made our way to the legendary Eskimo Joe’s to grab some famous cheese fries. Somewhere around 1 o’clock I remember forcing myself to head back to our hotel… because in 3 hours I had to be up again.
So come 4 am, I’m awake, and headed to the airport, en route to our studios in Charlotte, NC. Our basketball analyst Doug Gottlieb was there, and I’d like to say we talked on the plane … but that would be a lie. Yea, pretty much passed out the second the Fasten Seat Belt light came on. So eventually we arrived in Charlotte and headed to the studios, took a breath, threw on our suits, and started doin’ some college hoops shows. And that was most of our March.
We had some Great games in conference tournaments, that otherwise would Never have been visible to a national audience. Then once the NCAA tourney started, we were able to focus our time not only on the NIT games, but also, we gave exclusive previews of the men’s and women’s tournament games still to come on our signature studio show, "The U." If you wanted to hear directly from the Bobby Knights, Roy Williams’s and Bruce Pearls of the world… you turned to The U for their pre and post game media conferences. Though lets be honest- and if you watched you know - I focused most of my time on how to make fun of Doug.
We also had Tim McCormick join us for some hoops analysis. The former Michigan stud has a wonderfully dry sense of humor to go along with his big b-ball brain. Such gems included… MIKE: "Tim, why has JJ Redick made only 3 of his last 15 three pointers?" Tim’s answer, in straight face: "Well Mike, he’s been Missing most of his shots." Brilliant. We also covered the women’s tournament with the head coach of the WNBA’s San Antonio Silver Stars… Dan Hughes.
Around the end of March, we shifted our attention to the hockey rink. Basically, if you wanted to see Any hockey at all this time of year, you were only getting it from us. The men’s NCAA hockey tournament was shown live on espnU. And college hockey guru Bob Norton joined us to impart wisdom… including on how to properly pronounce Worcester, Mass. (the best phonetics I can do for you is ‘WUSS-tuh’)
And since then, we’ve also covered wrestling, lacrosse, spring football practices, and many other college sports that have never before been given this stage. The response we’ve had so far has been great. Most of you have been upset we hadn’t done this Earlier!
A reminder: the best way to get our channel is to call your local cable operator and tell them you want espnU. Or, you can always get DirecTV, and turn to channel 609 inside the sports package. Thanks for watching, thanks for reading, and thanks for being a part of the experience. Man, the fun we’ve had… and we’re not even two months old…
