Feb. 13, 2008

Mike Lockert has served as the radio voice of the Notre Dame hockey team for the past six seasons, calling the action on South Bend's ESPN Radio 1490. This is the story of how a broadcaster from Los Angeles, Calif., got involved in college hockey.

The Voice of the Irish
By Mike Lockert

My earliest recollection of college hockey was in the early 1980's, when the Great Western Freezeout was played at the Great Western Forum in Inglewood, Calif., a suburb of my hometown, Los Angeles.

Another early memory came in 1985 when the USA Network carried the NCAA final when RPI won a national championship over Providence College.

Admittedly, I was not a college hockey fan. I remember following the Los Angeles Kings when I was a kid because growing up the Lakers seemed to be okay and got better once "Magic" Johnson came to town. The Dodgers were capturing National League West titles it seemed every other year with the Cincinnati Reds, while the Rams, yes, that's correct the Los Angeles Rams were in southern California before moving to that mausoleum in St. Louis and were also winning games with their head man, "Ground" Chuck Knox.

Following the Los Angeles Kings was fun when I was younger. Not because I understood the game immediately or even laced up a pair of skates. The reason the game was fun, was because the announcer made every rush up the ice sound exciting. He made every goal sound like a playoff goal and every tight game seemed to be the seventh game of the Stanley Cup. Despite the poor performance of the Kings, the game was a rush and I was taken in by the words and the pictures. It was around that time in my life I realized that what Kings' announcer Bob Miller was doing was exactly what I wanted to do.

Over the course of the years, one thing remains constant and that is this is a tough business to get into and being in the right place at the right time is just as important as what one has learned and who one knows. For me, the latter came on a February day in 2000 while sitting in the press room of the former Pond in Anaheim.

At one point in my life, I got to know a guy who wrote for a newspaper in Winnipeg. It was a Monday evening when he approached me and mentioned a friend of his worked with a team (Huntington Blizzard) in the East Coast Hockey League and the team was in need of an announcer ASAP. Within three days, I received a call from the newspaper writer informing me that I would receive a call within the next couple of days regarding the position. After receiving the call and interviewing via telephone, I was on my way to Huntington, West Virginia, 10 days after being approached about the position.

Other than covering the Kings and Mighty Ducks of Anaheim for eight years, this was my entry into hockey, but it did not last long. As a matter of fact, as is the case sometimes with minor league sports, "pay" was on the short end and so were the fans and the doors closed on the Blizzard.

I went home to Los Angeles and returned to radio work and covering professional and collegiate sports. Once at home, the taste of play-by-play broadcasting stayed with me. Eventually, I was approached in March of 2002 to work with a minor leagues baseball team in South Bend, Ind. Little did I know that it would be the foray into a great job.

At the end of the baseball season, the radio station carrying both Notre Dame baseball and hockey approached me, asking if I had ever broadcast hockey and would I be interested in being the play-by-play announcer for Notre Dame Hockey. After taking a about a nano second to say yes, I have been broadcasting Irish hockey for six years and it has been beyond fun. In having the ability to broadcast Division I hockey, I have grown to enjoy the game that I liked as a child on a different level.

College hockey has impacted me in such a way that I have told friends, family and colleagues that I would love to stay around the college game as long as I can. Being around college hockey has afforded me the opportunity to visit campuses I had heard of as a child; places like Michigan, Michigan State and Ohio State and to other schools and universities I only became familiar with when visiting the campus for the first time.

The journey for me has seen its ups and downs, but it is a journey that I would not want to detour in any way, shape or form. The people I have come in touch with, from coaches, players, sports information directors and colleagues has made this part of my journey well worth the trip and I look forward to traveling this road a little while longer.