In the bottom right corner at the bottom answer the question by choosing wrestling! In the last few days wrestling has gotten features in SI and ESPN.com (including an article at the link below) More votes now for wrestling and maybe more chances to see it on tv!

http://sports.espn.go.com/ncaa/index

Great idea..I voted, for sure.....but it's a stupid question...Basketball is NOT my favorite winter sport.......

What is impressive is that Kansas is third out of all the states and that wrestling is winning both internationally and nationally. Montana is insane with 100%, guess they don't play hockey in Montana.
It is nice to see wrestling in the media, we need as much coverage as possible. Wouldn't it be great to have the State Championships broadcast throughout the State, regardless of school classification! Ahh to dream!
Nice post Mr. Sweazy!
Coach Brown

Coach Brown,

I spent a few years up in Nebraska before moving back to Kansas. The public television network up there does broadcast the state tournament throughout the entire state. They split the screen four ways so you can see all four matches at once. Nebraska only has 4 classes divided up A,B,C and D instead of 1A, 2A, etc. I believe they only broadcast the finals, but it was still nice to see it live. If I remember correctly, the local radio stations would give updates throughout the weekend as the rounds were completed to let everyone know how the tournament was going.

Don't be surprised to see 4a being broadcast soon on tv like 3a does. I have connections in Salina that told me I could produce shows if I wanted to for the public access including duals. Hopefully I get back in touch with the guy and am able to next year get Saline area duals on TV with Salina South, Salina Central, St. John's Military, SES, and any other team I might be forgetting.

The guy (name slips my mind right now) had Reuben Montoy and myself on a show about cancer survivors that lasted about an hour. We were 2 on a panel of 5 and both of us involved heavily in the sport of wrestling!

I probably should've started a new thread for this but it kinda goes with the flow of this one. Wichita has a couple of TV stations that are both on Cox Cable that I've often thought would work great for televising the state tournaments. They are Channel 22 (ABC-KAKE satellite station I believe) and channel 62 (not sure of affiliation). Channel 22 seems to always have re-runs of the news or weather. I think they switch between Wichita & Topeka news teams. Channel 62 runs a few WSU basketball games (some re-runs) and that's about it. You would think they're both exploring ideas for filling their time slots. The question is, who would you approach about the possibility of getting wrestling some air time? Would they consider simulcasting with the company that that commentates they 1A-3A State Tournament?
Does anyone have any thoughts or suggestions?

The only problem with the 321A tourney is that you can only see it if you live close to Hays. The family members of my wrestlers will only get to see them wrestle if they go to Hays. It does not broadcast here in Sabetha or I assume in Wichita. I do not know who the broadcast teamis in Hays, you could prolly call the Ft. Hays Recreation Department and they could tell you who to get in touch with. We could also do what Nebraska does and get a four panel screen and put all four matches up on one screen. It would be cool to see all of them, after I record them, as I hope to be matside in 321A during the finals!
Coach Brown

The station that broadcasts the 321A state tournament is KOOD-TV out of Bunker Hill, KS. Their broadcast of the finals used to run at a later date all around the state on the various PBS stations. I would guess you would have to contact your local PBS station about linking up and carrying the coverage live.

The producer at KOOD is Les Kinderknecht and he's a great guy, but I'm not sure he's gonna be able to help you. I doubt they have the funding, nor the equipment to be at that many sites to simulcast all the state tournaments.

If either Les or your local PBS station (or any other TV/Radio station) is going to be able to do you any good you'd better be contacting them NOW. They're going to need to figure out the logistics, AND sell sponsorships to fund it. They won't be doing it as a public service... they're in business to make money.

The Topeka PBS station has televised the 321A tourney in the past years.

One advantage that Nebraska has is that all classes are in one location for the state tournament in Lincoln. If Kansas is going to continue to split everyone up then this will be quite the undertaking to get accomplished. Perhaps this is something that can be worked on for next year if we start now.

Do we have a venue, that is open that weekend, to be able to get all 4 State tourneys in one location? In Kansas it always seems like a source of pride to go to the differnet places that weekend. Growing up and wrestling in Pratt is was fun to drive only 70 miles to State in Wichita. Being an assistant in Manhattan it was fun to go to the 6A mats and be a part of something different and to watch Hat town win a great many matches. It was fun last year to go to the 321A tourney in Hays, the gym still feels the same as when I attempted to wreslte there for the Tigers, electric. I just want to know the TV schedule so I can Tivo it or something, it seems like it is only on at 2am on PBS mixed in with the Irish Folk Dancers or something similar.
Of course Nebraska has a unicameral legislature too so ya can't give them that much credit(joke). We see many of the Nebraska teams being only 7 miles from the border, Auburn, Falls City, etc. along with many Missouri teams. They all talk about Omaha Scut and how tough they are. So I ask you o knowledgeable Nebraskite, Briksdad, how good are they? This is just for my own personal interest, I now it has nothing to do with the topic of this post.
Coach Brown

Coach,

Skutt is a very good team. They have won the Class B state championship every year since 1998. I was talking to some parents from Cozad when we were at the Norton Invite and they said that this was going to be the best team Skutt has ever put together if that tells you anything.

On the other subject, I do realize that we will probably never get all of the classes in one place for the state tournament. I was just saying that if we as a wrestling community really want all of the state finals broadcast over public tv, then we better get started on it now.