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NEWS, NOTES &
COMMENTARY
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The Bradsher Beat
Wednesday, November 4, 2009
By Bethany Bradsher |
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Pirate Nation primed for
primetime
By
Bethany Bradsher
©2009 Bonesville.net
All rights reserved.
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Bethany Bradsher
writes that this week's
ESPN telecast of the
East Carolina-Virginia
Tech game will mark
the network's seventh
Thursday night
broadcast of a game
from Dowdy-Ficklen
Stadium. |
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It would probably be a whole lot easier for J.J. McLamb if all of Greenville
could just take the day off on Thursday.
But since no official holiday was declared for the day of the East
Carolina-Virginia Tech game and business and schools will go on as usual,
McLamb’s job has been exponentially more complicated in the past few weeks.
As ECU’s assistant athletic director for administrative affairs, McLamb is
the one who has to make sure game traffic doesn’t wage a furious battle with
rush hour on Thursday afternoon.
That’s only part of the
challenge for McLamb, who greeted the ESPN production crews when they
arrived on Sunday and has since been making sure they have everything they
need to broadcast the game.
McLamb has also been
scheduling the hundreds of people who will work as ushers, ticket takers,
security guards and concession workers on Thursday night. Even a regular
Saturday game requires a massive workforce, but for the Hokies’ visit McLamb
hired extra security.
“We started meeting to
talk about all of this six months ago,” said McLamb, who communicates
regularly with police and city officials to make sure no stone goes
unturned.
Coach Skip Holtz recently
told McLamb that if Holtz is doing his job coaching the team, then he will
regularly give McLamb new and greater challenges as well. With football
success comes the opportunity to host larger opponents on a larger national
stage, and McLamb embraces the opportunity to prove that Greenville can be
just as hospitable as any BCS school.
Thursday’s game will be
the seventh Thursday night ESPN broadcast from Dowdy-Ficklen Stadium, but
one aspect of the coverage will be new to the Pirate Nation — the ESPN
SkyCam. The computer-controlled, cable-suspended camera system was
introduced for college games last year, McLamb said, but it will make its
first appearance at East Carolina on Thursday.
When all of the cables,
booms and parking attendants are in place and thousands start to stream
through the turnstiles, the burden will shift from operations staff to the
players.
McLamb sets the table, in
a sense, but no one ever remembers a game for the efficiency of its traffic
flow. So Holtz and his staff are doing their part to prepare for a Hokies
squad known for its explosion plays on offense and its tenacity on defense.
Even though Virginia Tech
is coming off of two losses, the defending Atlantic Coast Conference
champions have an abundance of weapons and a coach with 23 years of
experience in motivating teams in every situation.
Statistics like these
illustrate the Hokies’ strengths: Three different receivers have caught
passes of 60 yards or more this season on offense, and the VT defense has
forced opposing teams to go three-and-out on 40 percent of their
possessions.
“The key in this game is,
we can’t give up the home run ball,” Holtz said. “Offensively, we can’t win
a track meet. We need a baseball score.”
Holtz has always looked
at Virginia Tech as a blueprint of what East Carolina can become, and the
series between the two gets more competitive every year. Virginia Tech has a
9-5 edge, but ECU pulled out a victory last year, and the Hokies’ consistent
excellence makes the faceoff an important annual gauge of the Pirates’
progress.
ECU is hobbled by
injuries to offensive contributors like Jamar Bryant and Rob Kass, and the
defense will have to bring all of its strengths to bear against top Hokies
like quarterback Tyrod Taylor and running back Ryan Williams.
But the Pirates have
confidence after a solid Conference USA win over Memphis, putting them atop
the East Division for this midseason non-conference break. Add to that
momentum the bedlam that will surely overtake Dowdy-Ficklen Stadium by
kickoff, and the product is an ECU program — team and fans combined — that
is poised for a true battle.
“There’s an awful lot of
buildup to this game and an awful lot of excitement,” Holtz said. “I think
Greenville will come to life a little bit Thursday.”
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11/04/2009 03:46 AM |
