Inside HOKIE SPORTS | Vol. 13 No. 6 | June 2021

8 Inside Hokie Sports whv Warm Hearth Village • Living and Learning Together heart G O O D F O R and soul the retire.org • (540) 552-9176 Our 220-acre campus offers room to roam amidst lush woodlands as well as opportunities to connect socially and for recreation. Choose Warm Hearth Village, where YOU create a retirement that’s good for your heart and soul. He is also a fantastic stats guy. He lost his wife during the 2019 season and missed a game. Mikey, Bill Roth and I all attended her funeral in Harrisonburg. Because we love him. For years, Esther Myers had made treats on game day for the crew. My wife, Renee, now carries on her tradition. Luther Maddy, former defensive standout and our pre and postgame analyst will get there a couple of hours before kickoff. I was drawn to Luther during my first season here when he was still playing. He had a magnetic smile and was so welcoming to me that I decided to make him a part of the broadcast. It’s been fulfilling to see him grow into the role and our family. Johnny Alga will arrive last. He drives in from Richmond and has a baby now. But his wife still lets him spot for me. I would be lost without him. Most spotters just give jersey numbers, etc. Johnny gives me tidbits about Hokies past and present throughout the broadcast. Don’t tell him, but at times it has made me a little lazy in my preparation because I know he’s got me covered. Then we will connect with our network producer, Paul Roper, who is in Winston-Salem, NC, running the whole operation. And soon thereafter we will get back to doing what we do. Describing the greatest scene in all of college sports. Lane Stadium at night. I will cry during the first commercial break. There’s no way around that fact. I imagine there may be a few thousand others with moist eyes down below us. As it should be. These are my people, and this is my place. It’s also your place. Filled with your people. All of our stories are different and all of our struggles through the past year have no doubt heightened our appreciation for what we have in life. Beyond my wife and family, this experience is what I have realized is atop my list. My entire year centers around game days. I prepare for them; I talk about them at events and around town and on the radio. I format our radio network and our broadcast. I go to practice, talk to players and coaches to gain information and then game day arrives. I live for them. I have always appreciated the game days and the big wins, but until this last year, I didn’t truly realize how much I needed them. I like to think that I have been open about my own mental health and I have always been cognizant of the impact of depression and anxiety on my life. I have tried – and failed – countless times during my life to explain what depression feels like to people that don’t suffer from it. I’ve discovered that there’s no good way to do it and I always conclude the conversation by saying, “I’m just glad you don’t have to deal with it.” I mean that because it sucks. That’s not very eloquent, but it is true. My dad was the exact same way and that gave me somewhat of a guide as to how to manage it. For both of us, our medication was excitement. Travel, meeting new people and experiencing new places. And sports. Always sports. Playing them growing up and doing what I do now for the last 21 years. And sports were a consistent remedy. Sure, I’d still get down, particularly in the off-season, but sports would always return soon enough. In recent years, I’ve discovered a new tonic through lifting weights at the team basketball facility. It gives me the sense of community I miss during the off-season—and the competition too. Obviously, all of that went away last year. The people, the experiences, even the weight room. And I had lost my dad shortly before the pandemic hit. He was the one person who truly understood what life would be like without those things. I’m not going to lie to you. I struggled mightily. Feelings of hopelessness and inadequacy with nothing to fill the void. It becomes a spiral. It did for me, and I imagine for some of you too. None of this is meant to bring you down. I got through those times with my wife and Hokies. My friends on the basketball and football staffs. A golf group with some of our Olympic sport coaches and our compliance director. And ultimately, I got through it with the knowledge that one day we would come back together again as Hokies and jump again. I have made it. You have made it. We have lost so much and so many, and we will honor that and them on September 3rd. And we will celebrate their lives the only way we can. By cherishing what they did, and we still do. The belonging to this community. On September 3rd, I will utter the words “we now look down on a scene we will never take for granted again.” By saying those words, I will be talking about much more than a football game. It is about family. It is about community. It is about belonging to Hokie Nation. Blacksburg will become Blacksburg again—A Special Place. I am counting the days until we can unite once again in our collective joy. See you soon, Hokies! Continued from page 7