Brad Bennewitz- Voice of the Streaks

My grandparents lived in Galesburg. They had a second floor apartment at 153 East North St. They had no TV until the late 1960’s. They had a small den with a huge wooden cased radio that took about two minutes to “warm up.” They were huge Streaks fans. They had no car and not a lot of money so they never went to games, but they went to the den and listened to all the games on WGIL. They could quote things Coach Thiel said in the pre-game and post-game interviews. And they knew their Streaks. And they enjoyed the broadcasts so much.

Brad Bennewitz is the one who has been “painting the picture” of Streaks football and boys basketball for years. He is not a good play by play announcer, he is a great play by play announcer. He is polished and professional in his presentation. And he is entertaining to listen to. Brad is an expert, but he doesn’t come across as an expert. He never gets in the way of the game.

Three things Brad is able to do in his broadcasts:

1-    He clearly recognizes he is talking about young, teenage kids. He never hangs a player out for their errors.

2-    He never tries to get into coaching, he describes the strategy being used, but he never second guesses the coaches.

3-    And, he doesn’t get into analysis of refs. So many people today are sure in every game that the refs are out to get a team. He refuses to get into the crazy world of attacking refs.

I know there are people just like my grandparents who are Streaks fans, and can’t get out to games- but they are home listening to Brad describe the games. And I know they are enjoying his work!

Massey- Your major in college was broadcast journalism? Was this an area you had always wanted to go into? What was your motivation for going into this area?

​Brad- My undergraduate degree is a B.S. in Journalism with a broadcast news track. The news, specifically, was not originally my intended area of focus, but it was a means to an end toward sports broadcasting. Most of my college professors told me my main route of getting to do sports play-by-play would be with a broadcast sales degree, which would allow me (once someone hired me) to secure as much advertising as I could for the games I wanted to cover. However, sales does not appeal to me in any way whatsoever, so I went against their advice and pursued news because it was far more interesting to me. I figured it would at least get me into the doors of someplace that covered games, and I could weasel my way into the sports area if I had to. Fortunately, it worked out in the long run.

Massey- Several years ago, I talked to Jason Shay about wanting to take my son to some famous college arenas. I asked for his suggestions, and he immediately said I needed to take him to Allen Fieldhouse for a game. I was not disappointed, it was a fantastic experience. I don't think the average person realizes how special the atmosphere at Allen Fieldhouse is. How would you explain Kansas basketball to other people? What are some of your great memories as a student at Kansas?

​Brad- Explaining Kansas basketball is not nearly as effective as experiencing it. The atmosphere is palpable -- there really is a feeling to just being in the building. At least part of that is the age of Allen Fieldhouse, but it's also the ongoing tradaitions (the pep band counting down the final minute of the warmup clock with its slow-to-rapid fire rendition of the fight song, "waving the wheat" when an opposing player fouls out, the Rock Chalk Chant in the final minute of an imminent victory). Not many facilities that were built in the 1950s are still around. Alumni of Bradley and Illinois State can attest that the games never felt the same and their schools lost a significant home court advantage after they moved (respectively) away from Robertson and Horton Fieldhouses. KU has done all it can to preserve and build upon its history.

My two favorite memories of KU basketball​:

1. Watching the Jayhawks win the National Championship my freshman year. Staying up all night to celebrate the victory, the school administration cancelling classes the following day, attending a parade in downtown Lawrence followed by a victory rally at the stadium ... I guarantee a person cannot help but become a lifelong fan of his or her school after experiencing such a monumental display of enthusiasm and spirit. The fact that the season was full of challenges that the team overcame, and the fact that our final three wins in the tournament were against the three teams that had beaten us at home that season, made for a super memory. My favorite t-shirt that came out of the National Championship showed the losing scores at home to K-State, Duke and Oklahoma on the front of the shirt; on the back of the shirt were the winning scores against those same three teams in the NCAA tournament with the inscription, "Paybacks are hell."

2. Being at KU's 150-95 win over Kentucky with two guys who - to this day - are two of my closest friends. Rick Pitino was in his first season at Kentucky, which was on NCAA probation, and didn't have the horses to run the up-tempo style of game that he would eventually implement. But he tried to do it anyway and refused to abandon the full-court press against our team, which was far more conditioned, deeper, and experienced. The result was a game that still holds several "best-ever" KU game records and "worst-ever" Kentucky game records. The fact that we three friends experienced it together is a priceless memory.

Massey- You came to Galesburg and got into radio work. What do you miss from working full-time in radio? Why did you decide to go into teaching then?

​Brad- Mostly, I miss seeing the people I used to work with on a daily basis. As for the work itself, you can be nice and call me "curious" or you can be harsher and call me "nosy," but I miss the feeling of knowing what's happening in and around the community (another reason working in news was a better fit for me than sales). The reason I switched to teaching is for a longer discussion, but the simple answer is 1) I wanted a connection to people in a deeper, more meaningful way that helped me feel that I was making a positive difference; 2) after my daughter was born, I began to grow dissatisfied with the never-ending demands of a news/sports reporter and desired a more stable schedule.

Massey- I was very lucky my first year. We were supposed to teach five periods per day and have one prep period. My principal gave me four periods to teach and then a "hall duty." He gave me a desk in a little used hall and told me to sit there and work on lessons. It saved me having another prep period.  I remember seeing you during your first year teaching. You had to have been spending somewhere between 12-18 hours per day. First years are loing!! Did you have second thoughts? I am sure that it has settled down now, what did you learn that allowed you to shorten your days?

Brad- As a morning news person, I got up between 3 and 4 a.m for 15 years, so a main reason I would have such long days was that I continued to wake up at a very early hour instinctively for another two years (and still do at times). ​I am someone who needs to feel prepared in all that I do, so I would just use those early hours as additional prep time, which helped me feel as ready as I could for the career change and for daily classes. I did not allow myself to have second thoughts because I knew those first few years would be challenging. My wife and I agreed that changing careers was a significant investment that was not to be wasted by quitting after a year or two and taking the easy route back to broadcasting just because teaching was hard. If I was miserable after five years, that would have been a different story. I believe being a more "experienced" first-year teacher (as opposed to someone coming straight out of college) helped me in the long run. Covering some very difficult news stories over the years forced me to learn how to leave work at work. Similarly, when the school days were hard, I was able to leave bad days behind me when I went home at the end of the day. Twelve years later, I do sleep better. Most of the time.

Massey- What made you decide to get back into announcing and doing games?

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​Brad- Essentially, the timing was right. The position opened at WGIL when Mike Perry left the station to work at Knox College; I had been teaching for four years and felt confident enough in what I was doing that I felt I could handle the additional load of a part-time job. I missed broadcasting, but I missed broadcasting the games with my very close friend Jim Lee even more, so the stars aligned and General Manager Roger Lundeen was gracious enough to let me return.

Massey- In my opinion, you are VERY good doing play by play. You are polished and easy to listen to. You are better than some of the people doing national broadcasts. Was it ever your dream to become an ESPN type sports? 

​Brad- First of all, I am truly humbled by the question, and I honestly don't know how to say "thank you" in a way that truly conveys how much that compliment means to me. Traveling all over the place doing a "game of the week" or just doing whatever was assigned to me is not something that ever appealed to me. As a kid and early in my career, my ultimate goal was eventually to have a play-by-play job with a Major League baseball team (preferably the St. Louis Cardinals).

After meeting and marrying my wife Kelli, who is a Galesburg native, my priorities changed and I realized my life goals were far more important than my career goals. As a community, Galesburg offers what I value as a place to live and to raise a family. Geographically, it's close to both Kelli's family and mine, which is something I did not want to sacrifice. I don't think I would have minded the travel that's associated with having a major sports announcing job as long as I would have had the stability of covering one team or program during a season and living in that team's community; looking back on the trajectory of my life and how and why things have changed as they have, I might have grown weary of that as well.

Massey- As a high school coach, sometimes I can get frustrated by refs and the thought goes through my mind that I should just run on the floor and go nuts- and get kicked out of the game. So far rationality has prevailed and I have not done this. It seems to be so easy for announcers to get upset with refs and then just obsess. I am so impressed, you have always "told it like it is", without becoming a whiner about refs. Do you have similar thoughts like me- where you say this is the game to go off on refs? As you look back, have there been games in your career where you were really close to losing it?

​Brad- I want to be there - if it ever happens - when you just "run on the floor and go nuts - and get kicked out of the game." I think it would be impossible not to rank your outburst up there among my favorite memories of any sporting event. Again, thank you for the compliment because "telling it like it is" is what I have strived to do over the years. I acknowledge that I am a "home" announcer for the Silver Streaks or, on occasion, for other local teams when our stations have covered them, so I can't help but lean toward telling the story of a game more from that team's perspective. That doesn't mean, though, that I abandon my reporter's perspective.

Becoming a fan would diminish my responsibility as a broadcaster. Becoming a fan makes it too easy to get caught up in the mentality that "The refs are against us." At times, yes, I have questioned calls. Other times, I have said a referee made the wrong call, but that's only when I clearly saw what happened - and usually because I had a better view of the play than the official did. I don't make a big production out of it, though. Usually, I'll make a simple observation that Team A "got a break" there, or the crowd or the coach "clearly disagrees" with the call.

My philosophy about referees has not changed: they have a very difficult job because someone is always going to be upset when the whistle blows. They are human, which means they are imperfect, so I am not going to sit there and harp on them any more than I am going to harp on a kid who makes a bad turnover. I refuse to be a part of instigating or escalating anything against a person on any level. Lord help me if anyone started to analyze all of the mistakes I make because I make plenty.

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 Massey- You have covered lots of games at GHS. As you look back, what have been some of your favorite games or most exciting to cover?

​Brad- Over the years, as Steve Cheesman and I have discussed at times this season, 

​the games and the memories really blur together. However, I have to start with the '​97-'​98 boys basketball season. T​he Supersectional game against Rockford Boylan that went overtime is among my "favorites" from that year. I don't know if I'll ever have a more special privilege in sports broadcasting than getting to call the Streaks in the ​state championship game just a few days later. The 1994 Regional championship victory against Richwoods and Purdue-bound Mike Robinson (which also went overtime) is among the first I remember as being really special. 

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Being a part of both broadcasts for the girls' and boys' Charleston Holiday Tournament championships in back-to-back wins over Teutopolis in 2010 was a lot of fun. And while I have called football games that had more down-to-the-final minute drama​ and were more naturally exciting (such as knocking off #1 Peoria in the 2016 regular season finale), being able to call the football team's first-ever playoff win the following week is something I will always be proud to have been a part of.

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 Massey- You have done lots of interviews or listened to your partners do lots of interviews. Who is on your list of best, most interesting, or most entertaining interviews?

​Brad- I always took great pleasure when I would have the chance to talk to Harley Knosher. He is easy to talk to, fascinating to listen to and learn from, and it never felt like "work." While I rarely had the chance to talk to him in an official capacity since we didn't cover Monmouth College basketball, I couldn't help but be entertained any time I would interview Terry Glasgow. Mike Reynolds is also entertaining, but because I interview him all of the time, it sometimes ends up being more of a hoop that we both jump through than flat-out fun. Both Terry and Mike have great facial expressions that often communicate something humorous that is intended more for the interviewer than for the audience.

I also enjoy talking football with Tim Dougherty. Over the years, not a lot of coaches have taken the time to share their philosophies about the sport they coach and how they approach the many different aspects of their job. I have enjoyed learning from Tim his strategies of coaching both kids and the game itself, and how his experiences have shaped the coach he is today. Both Tim and Mike have been very generous with their time to help me understand how they go about developing a program and teaching kids, and sometimes, just talking about life.

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 Massey- If you had the opportunity to interview anyone in the sports world, who would you love to interview?

​Brad- I would have loved to have had the chance to interview Stan Musial. If I had to pick an athlete living today, I'd go with Michael Jordan. He has a wide variety of experiences that make him far more layered than someone who just played the game, was successul, and then retired. In all that Jordan has done across multiple sports, at many different levels, both on and off the field, there would be a lot to talk about. For that reason, I think announcers would also have some of the most interesting stories to tell -- guys like Bob Costas, Al Michaels and Jim Nantz because they have covered multiple sporting events at all levels. 

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 Massey- I am not a Cardinal fan (unless they are playing the Cubs), but I am jealous of the Cardinal organization. I look at the Cardinals in baseball, the Spurs in basketball, and the Packers in football- none are in major markets but year after year they compete for championships. What do you think it is about the Cardinal organization that has enabled them to have so much success?

​Brad- Like any successful operation, I really think the story starts at the top. Back in the late 80's and early-to-mid 90's, the Cardinals ownership was more invested in brewing than baseball, and the product on the field suffered. The new ownership that took over in the mid-90s was local, and it understood, respected and valued the importance the community placed on the team. Green Bay's community ownership of the Packers is legendary. San Antonio, although I'm not as familiar with its ownership group, seems to have a similar investment in the entire community. They all built from the top down and back up again. It's not this simple, but the similar theme among all three seems to be a genuine and sincere interest and investment in the fan base, not just putting together a roster of players from one year to the next.

The Ricketts ownerhip of the Cubs is following the same path – approach the entire organization and operation -- and it looks like the Astros are doing the same. The Marlins clearly have not. While they have won two World Series titles since the 1993 expansion, what have they done to build a truly loyal and dedicated fan base? Some of the greatest enjoyment I have had covering high school sports is seeing a community unite through its student-athletes. Professional franchise ownerships that execute a similar approach -- win, yes, but unite the fan base through the team -- seem to me to be the most successful.