Subscribe to In Play with Craig Mattick on Apple, Spotify,YouTube or wherever you get your podcasts.
Craig Mattick:
Welcome to another edition of In Play. I am Craig Mattick. Today's guest may be one of the most recognized voices in South Dakota. Over the past four decades, if you've been to the state high school football championships in the DakotaDome, if you've been to the Howard Wood Dakota Relays, if you've been to the state high school track meet, if you've been to a Coyote football or basketball game, or several other track meets and cross-country meets around the area, you've heard his voice. He is one of the most recognized public address announcers in the state, a darn good one too. It's Greg Merrigan, and Greg, welcome to In Play.
Greg Merrigan:
Well, thank you Craig. It's an honor, appreciate the ask.
Craig Mattick:
I've missed you over the past year or so as you recently retired as the public address announcer for the state high school football playoffs, the state track meet, the Howard Wood Dakota Relays. You got to be missing it, aren't you, Greg?
Greg Merrigan:
Yeah, it was a big decision. I'm nearing 70 and my eyesight isn't the best and when I was back, at a state track meet, or Howard Wood or the playoffs, when you're that far away from the action and you just can't see it like you used to, I thought, "You know what? I think I better knock this off before I really screw something up and start mispronouncing names and stuff like that." So yeah, I quit the playoffs three or four years ago and then 2022 was my last year at Howard Wood and the state meet, and I do miss it. The neat thing about working at the state meet in Howard Wood is just the number of people that are involved in those events that you become friends with over the years.
Craig Mattick:
Yes. Yes.
Greg Merrigan:
So that part of it is what I really miss. Guys like you and Jeff Lukens down on the award stand, that part I do miss.
Craig Mattick:
Oh. Well, you're from Vermillion. You lived on a farm near Vermillion. What was farm life like for you back in the '60s and '70s?
Greg Merrigan:
Well, there were seven boys in our family and it was a pretty idyllic situation. Six of my brothers, six of us, were pretty close in age and we had another brother that came a few years later. So we were each other's best friends. We played on the farm together and, as we got older, we did all the fun things, like pile hay and walk beans, that farm kids loved to do. So it was a good lifestyle to grow up in. We only lived about a mile from town so we could ride our bikes in. We weren't way isolated, way out in the country-
Craig Mattick:
Sure.
Greg Merrigan:
... but a great place to grow up on a farm and I think it helped shape some of my values in my life, definitely.
Craig Mattick:
Well, with all those boys and those brothers, it had to be some great wrestling going on at times. Some fights going on.
Greg Merrigan:
You'd think so, but everybody knew the pecking order. So you didn't really pick on anybody that was older than you. So we actually got along pretty good.
Craig Mattick:
Where were you in the pecking order?
Greg Merrigan:
I was number four.
Craig Mattick:
Uh-huh. One of the middle guys.
Greg Merrigan:
Yep.
Craig Mattick:
Was it a big sports family? Was sports pretty important for all you guys at that time, for the whole family?
Greg Merrigan:
Yeah. My dad played for Vermillion high school football, and then played at the university for a couple years, and was always a big Coyote booster, so we fed off that. My older brother, Steve, had the mile run record at Vermillion High School for many years. My brother, Tom, was a really good football player. Younger brother, Nick, was a really good football player. So definitely, sports ran in the family, certainly.
Craig Mattick:
Well, you ran track at Vermillion High School. Were there any other sports that you were at least involved with?
Greg Merrigan:
Played football, at the bequest of my dad. I really wanted to run cross country, but he just subtly said, "You probably should play football." So I did play basketball for a couple years, but track was my first love in high school, emulated my brother, Steve, who had the Mile run record. I really looked up to him. He was a really good track athlete and that definitely inspired me.
Craig Mattick:
Yeah. So what events were you in? Was it long distance?
Greg Merrigan:
Pretty much, 800 and the mile. Back then, the 880 in the mile.
Craig Mattick:
Sure.
Greg Merrigan:
In fact, I saw Kevin Kesic on Saturday night at Vermillion High School Hall of Fame, and I reminded him that 50 years ago, this spring, we were part of a relay squad that set our school record at the state meet. And we both looked at each other like, wow, it's been that long? So medley relay, 880 and the mile run.
Craig Mattick:
So why do you suppose track was one of your favorite things to do?
Greg Merrigan:
I was tall and lanky, and I liked to run, and like I said, I watched my brother run when I was younger and that really inspired me. And always had good coaching here, they were good motivators. So I think just a number of things pointed me in that direction.
Craig Mattick:
Remember that tabletop hockey game, you had five metal rods which you could move back and forth, and on the end was a hockey player, and you had a little small puck, and you had to try to get it into your opponent's net? I was about 10 years old and when my two brothers would play that hockey game, it was always the Minnesota North Stars and the St. Louis Blues. I would do the play-by-play while they were playing.
Greg Merrigan:
Oh cool.
Craig Mattick:
I bring that to you because when you're running track with Vermillion High and you weren't running, were you doing play-by-play of kids coming around the turn, down the straightaway?
Greg Merrigan:
I got that bug when I was a senior in high school. I got a chance to go to the Drake Relays, which I'd always heard about. Alan [inaudible 00:07:18] was our track coach and he took a couple other teammates and myself down. And the announcer down there was Jim Duncan, who I learned in later years going, was a legend. And he did this play-by-play, lots of trivia, lots of interesting stuff and I didn't really start announcing until probably six years later, and his style always stuck in my head. So when I did get behind a mic and start calling a track meet, he was the guy I tried to emulate.
Craig Mattick:
Nobody thought you were weird doing the play-by-play at a track meet when you were just there to watch it, before you really got into being a public address announcer. You just had that knack to it, didn't you, Greg?
Greg Merrigan:
I've told some other people this. You go to a football game and it's about three hours. Basketball game's an hour and a half, two hours. Track meets can get a little long. You can be out there all day long. So if you can do something that helps engage the fans with the athletes, I think it makes the whole event just a little more enjoyable. It's not like you're sitting there in silence for hour after hour. So that's what I've tried to do.
Craig Mattick:
So you're a senior at Vermillion High School. We're talking about 1974. What were your plans? Did you want to go to college? Was there maybe work you wanted to do? What were you thinking, back as a senior at Vermillion High?
Greg Merrigan:
Well, first and foremost, I was not a very good student in high school. I didn't apply myself very good and I went to college just because it was what everybody did. And I wanted to be a Mass Comm major, wanted to be in broadcasting, TV, radio, somehow. And I also was involved in journalism in high school, with our yearbook and our school paper. So when I was a freshman at the U, I was the assistant sports editor to Mike Mahon for The Volante.
Craig Mattick:
Ah, sure.
Greg Merrigan:
And I really enjoyed that. After one year, I got a construction job and I liked making a paycheck. So I just diverted away from college and never went back. So I really didn't do anything in college that prepared me for any kind of a career that I ultimately had, but it was a good one-year experience and it opened my eyes to some other stuff.
Craig Mattick:
I remember Mike, a great guy and just still doing some great work. So there was a point though, you thought, "Maybe I could be a sports writer."
Greg Merrigan:
Definitely. I really wanted to. After I was out of school for a while, I went to South Dakota State for a semester and majored in journalism-
Craig Mattick:
Oh, wow.
Greg Merrigan:
... and really enjoyed it. And when I came home that summer from my spring up there, I got a construction job again, and again, the money was pretty good. And at the time, probably not a good decision, but it was more appealing than going back to college. But yeah, I really did want to be a newspaper writer or sports writer. I really enjoyed journalism. Probably would've leaned more toward the print media than radio, or TV, or anything like that.
Craig Mattick:
I'm glad that didn't work out actually, Greg, with your future as a public address announcer. You got started doing that, though, very early in college at USD. I think it's about 1975. What was that first experience with the microphone like, as a public address announcer?
Greg Merrigan:
Well, Mike and I were covering a USD JV football game, and Ron Lenz was the sports information director at the time at USD. And he looked around the press box, there was probably a half a dozen people there and he said, "We need a public address announcer." And he looked at me and said, "Hey, you want to do it?" I said, "Yeah, what the heck?" It wasn't like there was a big crowd there and it was a JV game.
I'd never done anything like that before. I had spotted a little bit from Monk Johnson who was the long time public address announcer, so I'd been up in the press box in high school a little bit, helping him, and that was probably my first exposure to it. But that night, just spur of the moment, I did it and enjoyed it. I didn't really have an opportunity to do much until the DakotaDome opened five, six years later and then I got a little more steady at it. But the experience that Ron gave me always stuck with me, that it was something I enjoyed and there's a great camaraderie up in the press box, and that's what kept my interest in it.
Craig Mattick:
Well, that was of course at the old Inman Field there at USD, which now is, what, the law school down there at USD. And Monk Johnson was doing the Coyote games, right? Was Monk your mentor when it came to watching someone do the PA work?
Greg Merrigan:
Certainly. For one or two years in high school, and I can't quite remember how the opportunity presented itself, but I spotted for him. I sat right next to him, and I've watched him and observed him, and he had an old classic style. So I definitely took a lot of cues from him that helped me later on.
Craig Mattick:
Any memorable mistakes in those early years as a PA guy?
Greg Merrigan:
Not necessarily mistakes. That very first JV game that I did, after I sat down and looked over the roster with Ron, he said, "Now, Coach Salem is playing some redshirt kids tonight and you're going to have to make up names for those kids because," he said, "They're not supposed to be playing."
Craig Mattick:
Oh.
Greg Merrigan:
So we put some notes by a dozen kids that were supposedly redshirted but that were playing, and it opened my eyes a little bit, like what is going on here?
Craig Mattick:
That's awesome.
Greg Merrigan:
I think one year, one of the first years I did the state football playoffs in the Dome, it was always a little confusing before the game, we'd introduce one team's offense and one team's defense. And it was always difficult to get that information up to the press box because they'd do a coin flip over in the corner, and if you didn't see what was going on... And you guys, public TV, was doing the game and I was supposed to be introducing Winner's offense and I start introducing their defense, and nobody was running out on the field, and it was not a good moment.
Craig Mattick:
Besides that, what was the hardest part of being a PA announcer for the football championships? They began, of course, in 1981, they played in the Dome and you're from Vermillion. You got the gig to be the PA announcer, but what was the hardest part about doing that work in the Dome?
Greg Merrigan:
Definitely prepping. I was always meticulous about pronunciations. These kids are on statewide TV, it's a big moment for them, and you got to do them justice by pronouncing their name right. So I would always go down into the stands and find a parent, or a fan, or somebody and run through the rosters with them. And after a while, with a lot of schools co-oping and stuff like that, I'd find a fan from Tripp and there might be kids there from Armour and, well, they didn't actually know those kids real well. So then I had to go down and start talking to cheerleaders because the fans didn't always know the other kids' names on the co-op, but you definitely wanted to be prepared and you wanted to be able to coordinate it with the broadcast, timeouts, awards at halftime, awards after the game.
So definitely a lot of coordination to make sure that you weren't flubbing up the whole thing. If TV was going to go to the field for an award, you wanted to make sure that you had that coordinated. So that was a challenge sometimes. Now, they've got a producer or somebody who tells you when to talk or coordinates who's walking out on the field. But in those early days pronunciations and coordinating certain events related to the TV broadcast, that was definitely a challenge.
Craig Mattick:
I can certainly hear you too because with me doing ball games, it's really important for me too, that you get their name right. Because if you didn't get the name quite right, there's somebody coming to the booth to talk to you. There'd always would always be somebody.
Greg Merrigan:
Generally a mom.
Craig Mattick:
Yes, normally a mom, which is great because we want to get it right. Absolutely. In the-
Greg Merrigan:
One thing I started to do at the state track meet, I would send an email to all the coaches in the state and said, "Hey, if you've got a name that's a little unusual or difficult to pronounce, let me know." And coaches were really good about that, helping us out with that type of thing.
Craig Mattick:
Yeah, there's been times too though, where coaches don't necessarily know the last name either. I've gone through that a couple of times. They know their kids by their first names sometimes, and that makes it fun.
Greg Merrigan:
Yeah, good point. Good point.
Craig Mattick:
In the broadcast business, we call them a spotter, someone who will help the radio, or the TV guy, or the public address announcer. They'll help by pointing on the roster on who made the tackle, or interception, or touchdown. Did you have one and who were some of those people that helped you?
Greg Merrigan:
Yeah, definitely. In the early days of the football playoffs, USD provided the stat officials up top. So Larry Wittmeier, who's a Tyndall native, who's a barber here in town, he was always helping out up there. Steve Mayer, who's on campus here, would do the stats computer and he would hollow out stuff, or we would just have a designated spotter who would stand behind us with a set of binoculars and holler out. Gary Prosser, who's a dentist here in Vermillion, he kept stats for high school football playoffs in Vermillion High School, and he would always be one of the guys on the roll there that would holler out, maybe how many yards or that type of thing. So always somebody up there to assist and make the job a lot easier.
Craig Mattick:
You did the high school football championship games for 37 years. There has to be some memorable games that you did as the PA announcer in the Dome. Is there one that comes to your mind right away?
Greg Merrigan:
Yeah, probably Max Hawk's last game, Peter Martin was the quarterback for Rapid City Stevens, and it was just an epic game. A lot of scoring back and forth came, down to the wire, and Yankton ended up winning it, which was pretty fitting for Max, but that's one that always stands out for me.
Craig Mattick:
I'll never forget 1988, it was the 11 B championship game. I think it was right before halftime, one of the officials in the game, it was Doug Koester, collapsed on the field and died. I was doing the game on the radio at that time and it had a startling effect in the second half. Greg, did you do that game?
Greg Merrigan:
I didn't actually do that game. I was doing the one after that. I can't remember who did that game, but I walked into the Dome as he was out on the turf, and the first guy I ran into was Bob Meyer, who was the superintendent at Vermillion High School then. And I said, "What's going on?" And he explained the situation to me and you never heard that Dome so quiet.
Craig Mattick:
Yep. I remember.
Greg Merrigan:
And then I went up and start prepping for the game. I wasn't very directly involved in it, but I do remember that moment when I walked in and it was pretty obvious what was unfolding in front of us.
Craig Mattick:
Yeah. Yep. You took over the PA duties for USD Coyote football and basketball from the legendary Monk Johnson. Did Monk have any words of encouragement for you, when he retired and you took over?
Greg Merrigan:
Not really. We were moving over to the Dome and there was lot of stuff changing, new personnel, coaches, things like that, and I think he just seized the moment and thought, "This is a good opportunity to step down." And I can't remember who the athletic director was at the time, who asked me if I'd be interested. So Monk ended and I started, independent of each other.
Craig Mattick:
You were a busy guy, you were busy. You're working as the public address announcer for high school football championships, Coyote football and basketball, you're handling a number of track events. Did your real job get in the way at all, with all of those announcing jobs?
Greg Merrigan:
I tell you what, I worked for a rural water district and I worked for a board that was wonderful. I was able to pursue this. A lot of it's at night and on the weekends, so it didn't affect my work that much.
Craig Mattick:
Sure.
Greg Merrigan:
But if I needed a day off here or there, or something came up, they were very supportive of me and I probably wouldn't have had those opportunities in some other job where I couldn't have got off as much. So always had good cooperation from work.
Craig Mattick:
Yeah. Yeah, that real job was working for Clay Rural Water System. You worked there for almost 40 years, but what did you do with Clay Rural Water System?
Greg Merrigan:
I was a manager. In the early '70s, rural water systems became popular in South Dakota, especially along the east part of the state, and I always explain it to people, it's like a municipal water system where you have a water plant and a water tower, water mains, but it's out in a rural area. It covers much, much larger geographical areas. I started there in 1982 and worked there, as you said, for 38 and a half years, almost 40 years. So I was his manager, we were not a big organization, but we had some of the best people I ever worked with in my life, and it was really an enjoyable career. I stumbled into it, the gods aligned for me when that job became available. And the first board of directors that hired me really took a chance on me, and I was forever grateful that it was a great career.
Craig Mattick:
Well, you still love track at the time. It's 1995, and you begin announcing at the Howard Wood Dakota Relays in Sioux Falls, and the state track meet that same year. You had to be almost in heaven at that time, doing two great events.
Greg Merrigan:
It was a dream come true. I had been doing meets at the Dome, track meets, and Dean Mann and Rich Hanson would come down and start a lot of those meets. So I struck up a friendship with them, and about that time, Jim Burt had retired and Dean said, "Hey, would you be interested in coming to Sioux Falls?" And I said, "Yes." So he put me in touch with Mark Miley, who was the meat director for those meets back then. And Mike Holt, who's a popular figure around Sioux Falls, used to be a TV guy himself, he was also contacted. And then Dan Genzler, who has had a number of sports information positions, got asked too.
So the three of us all started at the same time, '95, did Howard Wood, did the state meet. And all had similar interests, we were all into trivia. So when we hit the ground running, that first year at Howard Wood in '95, things just went really well. We got along well and everybody supported each other. So it was definitely a dream come true, to be up there and then to be able to do the state meet too. Yeah, definitely a highlight at that time in my life.
Craig Mattick:
Well, how much preparation did it take to get ready for the Howard Wood Dakota Relays? You have some 3000 athletes. At one point in time, you had college athletes that were involved as well. That's fallen off the edge right now, but still, thousands of athletes involved. How did you prepare for that?
Greg Merrigan:
Howard Wood is probably the toughest meet that I ever worked, from just what you said. You've got high school kids from three or four different states. You've got colleges. Nowadays, you can find anything you want on the internet. There's all kinds of sites to go to get information, but back then it was more or less just trying to save newspapers, read preview stories in the local newspaper, you had to struggle for information. So you got it wherever you could, but a tough meet. You'd get a really good kid from Minnesota and you didn't know anything about him, and-
Craig Mattick:
Right. Right.
Greg Merrigan:
It was difficult to highlight everybody in those early years.
Craig Mattick:
How about the state track meet? How much preparation is involved there?
Greg Merrigan:
A little bit easier because you can find results from previous state meets and have them at hand, and then you know who you're dealing with. They're all South Dakota kids. So it's a little easier, lot of kids, lot of data, three classes, boys and girls. So you got six different races in every event, but the research was a little easier because you were dealing with a known quantity, looking at previous results, looking at newspaper stories from around the state. So that was a little bit of a breeze compared to what Howard Wood could be sometimes.
Craig Mattick:
What about some of the most memorable performances that you saw, you were involved with as the public address announcer? With the Howard Wood Dakota Relays, we saw a lot of out-of-state kids come to there with big performances over the years.
Greg Merrigan:
Yep. One that sticks to my mind was on Friday night, the 3,200 meter run. Joe Klecker from Hopkins, Minnesota, at that time, he had the fastest 3,200 time in the country, and I've always followed him since then. He's a pro runner now, but we had a little software program that we could enter a record time and then do splits. Every time he would come around, we'd say, "Record pace is this." And it was pretty neat to see that unfold. And we had a couple of websites up that had some national rankings, so we knew that he had a shot at doing something pretty special that night. That's probably one race that we had an indirect hand in, by keeping him on record pace.
Craig Mattick:
Oh, sure.
Greg Merrigan:
And then finding out that it was the top time in the country that year, that was probably one of the more special moments. The special events always, and those were easy to prepare for. Bruce Conley, some of those guys that did the previews for those special event participants, we would always get that script ahead of time. So you had some good information on them and they always seemed to find the best kids in about a three-state area. Kids that might not normally have come to Howard Wood, that special event was pretty special because it gave you an opportunity to see some kids that you might not ordinarily see. So Joe Klecker's 3,200 and those special events are probably the things that stand out about Howard Wood.
Craig Mattick:
How about the state track meet? You would see all three classes on the final day of the state meet. They put them all together now in Sioux Falls, but state track meet, a couple of performances that you can remember?
Greg Merrigan:
Yeah, I actually looked up the year, earlier today, and I think you featured Justin Horn of Tripp-Delmont. When he won, he scored 38 points and won the state Class B title all by himself. That was pretty remarkable. I remember seeing him standing up there with his coach holding the trophy and you were looking like, "Hey, where's the rest of the team?" And, well, that's it. That was pretty cool.
Craig Mattick:
Yeah, he's living in New Ulm, Minnesota, now, raising a family up there. So it was fun talking to him recently about that big event that he did all by himself.
Greg Merrigan:
Macy Hines comes to mind.
Craig Mattick:
Oh, yeah. Yeah.
Greg Merrigan:
19 state titles. She won everything from the hundred to the 3,200, with the exception of the two hurdle races. And if you look back at the history of the state track meet, that is really unique to have somebody win a hundred and also one year win the 3,200. I know it was a real honor to witness her every year. You just wondered, okay, what's she going to do for an encore? She was a pretty special kid and that always really sticks out.
The first meet I worked, the last event was a four by four, and in the girls race, Aberdeen Central had the baton and they had about a, probably, a 20, 25 meter lead over Mitchell. Well, Mitchell had Jill Theeler and everybody in the place knew what was going to happen. And I felt so sorry for that Aberdeen Central anchor.
Craig Mattick:
Oh. Oh. Oh.
Greg Merrigan:
Of course Jill ran her down and won, and the next year it was identical. Aberdeen Central had a big lead, here comes Jill. And both years, I just felt bad for that Aberdeen Central runner because everybody in the place knew what was going to happen. So it was pretty neat seeing her neat in action. She's still in the top 10, in a number of events.
Craig Mattick:
When it comes to participants or the spectators, we love our football. We love our basketball. Volleyball is pretty cool too, but there's something about Howard Wood and state track. The people in the stands, they know their track. They're huge track fans, and it's amazing when there is something special going on, the fans in the stands, they respond.
Greg Merrigan:
You bet. Bob Lowery, he told me once, he thought the final day of the state track meet was the greatest single day in the high school sports calendar, and I agreed with them. You've got the individual races, you've got team races. A lot of times the meet comes down to the four by four, and it's pretty exciting. And if you've got grandstands full of fans, that just adds to it. They feed off the athletes and the athletes feed off them. So it is pretty special.
Craig Mattick:
Yeah, it seems to always happen, the public address guy, he's got to say something weird, at a football or a track event. You got to announce somebody's license plate number because they're parked illegally. Get ready to be towed. Weirdest announcement you've ever had to make?
Greg Merrigan:
Well, the biggest slum up I ever made was right before the AA football championship game. We had about 10 minutes to kill. It was a Saturday, and I decided to read some college football scores from that day. And I think Louisiana Lafayette was upsetting LSU, and I turned to the guy beside me and I made a holy, not a good word. Well, the mic was still on and 8,000 people heard what I said, and I just thought, "Oh, How am I going to cover this?" So I just got right back into reading scores as if it never happened.
I've had a lot of people come up to me over the years and said, "Were you the guy that said a profanity?" And I bow my head and said, "Yep, that was me." So that's probably been my worst moment. Out in Rapid City, at the state meet one year, parking out there can be a challenge. And a lot of people were parking along the railroad tracks that run right behind the stadium. And a policeman came up and said, "There's a train coming through here in about two hours and we're going to have some problems." So we pleaded with people to get it back out there and move your car, a train's coming and it really took us away from announcing the meet.
Craig Mattick:
Oh.
Greg Merrigan:
But potentially it could have been disaster, so they wanted us to keep harping on it. So we kept harping on it.
Craig Mattick:
What's the hardest event as a public address announcer? Is it football? Is it basketball? Is it cross country, track? What do you think is the hardest one to do?
Greg Merrigan:
Cross country, a lot of times you're not doing a lot of play-by-play because you're in one stationary spot and the kids are way out on the course, and you might not be able to see them. Football, everything's right in front of you. Track could be a challenge just because of the rapid-fire nature. Say you're at the state meet and you got the finals of the a hundred, well, you have six hundreds right in a row, and if you need a little trivia or you want to look something up, or something's not quite clear to you before a race starts, you don't have a lot of time to recover or prepare because, whether you like it or not, the next race is in the starting blocks and ready to go. So I would say a state track meet, just because of the nature of the number of events and how quickly they're going off.
Craig Mattick:
Greg, you've received a number of awards as a public address announcer. A lot of us recognize your voice. We maybe didn't see your picture, but at least we heard your voice and knew who you were. But some of those awards like the USD Dan Lennon or the North Central Conference Noel Olson Award, Distinguished Service Award with the High School Activities Association, Howard Wood Relays, the Sioux City Relays, you're in the Hall of Fame with the Sioux City Relays. What do those all mean to you, Greg?
Greg Merrigan:
Oh, very, very gratifying. The biggest thing I take away from those awards is the people that I got to work with. You work at Howard Wood and a state meet, and you get to know the people that run the meet, the Mileys, Jeff Lukens, the starters, Steve Share and those guys. So to do those events with those people and then get recognized for it, that means a lot to me, to have shared a lot of time with those people, and getting recognized for anything after being a part of those events, it's pretty gratifying. Means a lot.
Craig Mattick:
Got a couple more for you, Greg. What would've happened in 1975 if Ron Lenz, the sports information director at the University of South Dakota, if he had not approached you or told you to do the public address announcing that day, what do you suppose would've happened?
Greg Merrigan:
I don't know. I've never really thought about that. I was around the Dome when a lot of stuff was going on, and I'm not sure whether that opportunity... I doubt it would've presented itself. I really owe it to Mike Mahon. He was a sports information director at the U, and he gave me some opportunities. He and I would go down to the Drake Relays every year. So if Ron wouldn't have given it to me, I think I would've still had the same opportunity from Mike. He just knew my love of track especially and gave me some opportunities. So it may have happened, but who knows?
Craig Mattick:
It's not easy being a public address announcer. You did multiple sports and, by the way, done very well. How would you describe the way you handled the job?
Greg Merrigan:
I hope I did justice to the kids that were out on the field or the track. That's my number one goal. If there's a kid running or a kid scores a touchdown, you want to give them credit for their hard work, and I always strive to do that. So I guess I feel some satisfaction in trying to have done that to give them their dues, so to speak.
Craig Mattick:
In Play with Craig Mattick is made possible by Horton in Britton, where smiling at work happens all the time. Apply now at hortonww.com. If you like what you're hearing, please give us a five star review, wherever you get your podcast. It helps us gain new listeners. This has been In Play with me, Craig Mattick. This is a production of South Dakota Public Broadcasting.
