Diary of a commentator

[Conigliaro's Potential]

The ELF Championship Game is coming up on Sunday...and I've been doing my first ever Reddit AMA, over on the ELF subreddit:

https://www.reddit.com/r/elf/comments/xih1fj/ama_im_commentating_on_the_elf_championship_game/

It's been fun. Sparsely attended, but fun. And in a possibly related story, I just got a Facebook friend request from the Rhein Fire's starting quarterback (who started for Hamburg in last year's title game). Never had any athlete reach out to me before like that...I don't know what to do with my hands.

 

[Conigliaro's Potential]

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pr5QKSOWQWc

I called the ELF Championship Game today, despite feeling poorly and being very worried last night - based upon how my son felt and sounded during his two days off from school this past week - that I'd sound like Cris Collinsworth did in that SNF game the other week. I slept late (skipping church) and have spent much of my evening lying down as well, but in between I managed to pull myself together and sounded pretty normal, I think. We had a technical glitch in the transmission which was a huge boon to me as well: the feed from the stadium in Klagenfurt (Austria) didn't connect with us until only 5 minutes remained before the opening kickoff, whereas I was supposed to start introducing the game 15 minutes before kickoff as normal. So I didn't have to speak for those 10 extra minutes in a row, which definitely helped me get up and running.

Anyway, 11-2 Vienna quite comfortably defeated 12-1 Hamburg by the score of 27-15, so that's two straight Championship Games the Sea Devils have now lost. I enjoyed the game and will miss not calling any more football the rest of the year, but I'm equally happy to have had a quiet rest of the day. And I'm now off until the CHL resumes a week on Tuesday.

 

[Conigliaro's Potential]

The CHL resumes tonight...and I won't be commentating. Sparta Prague's charter flight to Finland had a technical defect, so their game at Jukurit won't be going ahead as scheduled. I'd already scripted all of my introductory material and researched a number of extra players in Sparta's squad - their teamsheet for today had already been made available to me, and they'd put no fewer than 10 players age 21 or under in their lineup, about half of whom I'd not prepared for - but it looks like all of that might go to waste. (I don't know if I'll even get paid for what I've done so far; hopefully it'll be rescheduled for early enough tomorrow that I can call both Jukurit v Sparta and Red Bull Salzburg v Fribourg-Gotteron, but that seems unlikely.)

 

[Conigliaro's Potential]

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5JIoi3DrTe8

Last night's match was so forgettable - "One for the purists," I began my highlight voiceover - that I forgot to write about it straightaway after the fact. Fribourg-Gotteron defeated Red Bull Salzburg 1-0 in a match of few real chances; it was almost soccer-like, really. Going into the final day of the Group Stage next week, 15 of the 16 places in the Knockout Stage have already been filled; I'm lucky that the last spot up for grabs is being contested in part by Red Bull Salzburg, so I'll at least have one live game to be calling, but although there are a couple of other groups where first place (and better seeding) is up for grabs, it's going to be a pretty dull final week.

We did hire an Englishman to call a couple of games this week. Tim does Euroleague Basketball and works for MUTV ("MU" = Manchester United) among his other duties, so he's a very seasoned commentator, and he does follow hockey here in the UK...but these were the first two hockey games he'd ever called, and after his first game I told him that I thought he'd sounded more like he was calling a soccer match than a hockey game. I'd actually be interested in everyone's thoughts about the feedback I gave to Tim - I spoke to him about this having first prepared the following email, which I used as my hotes for the call:

With regard to [the perception that you sounded like you were calling a soccer match rather than a hockey game], I’m not entirely sure this is even a criticism, and I’ve talked with a couple of our producers at Infront to try and get their take on this, because I’m not sure about the extent to which I’m unfairly biased about all of this. But my thought process is that outside of the UK – and to a certain extent even within the UK – most hockey watchers will primarily have the North American style of ice hockey commentary in their head, mainly from the NHL but also from other international competitions staffed by North American commentators. The North American hockey commentary style tends to sound somewhat radio-like, in that a) players are identified more regularly as new people touch or get close to the puck, and b) a real sign of commentator quality (for me at least) is the artfulness used to describe certain passages of play whose equivalents might go unremarked upon at all in a televised football match. Also, North American-style goal calls in hockey tend to include a “He scores!” exclamation or the equivalent, whereas football goals can often be much more muted. I’ve thought about this point a lot over the years and come to the conclusion that in football, goals usually don’t come out of nowhere – the build-up is typically transparent, and you can often feel a goal coming before the ball goes in the net – whereas in hockey, slapshots which go into the net often look exactly the same as ones which are saved or miss the target right up to the point that they go in. And even when they don’t, passing moves in hockey are often much, much faster to develop than they are in football. So there’s an element of surprise in hockey goals which merits a more exclamatory goal call.

We’ve not yet reached a consensus on whether having a British-accented, football-style commentator is a potential distraction, or possibly even a nice change of pace from normal North American commentators. But I think it would be helpful for us to hear you attempt to use a somewhat more North American style in commentary this evening (on Slovan vs. Rapperswil) – sounding a bit more excited on the goal calls and other excitable incidents, and being a bit more descriptive when possible and where appropriate. I suspect that may take you somewhat out of your comfort zone, but don’t worry about that; I’m confident enough in your core ability in the more British/football-like style that you can think of tonight as an experiment. Does that make sense?

Any thoughts, particularly regarding the passage I've highlighted in red? It was certainly rather interesting for me to think through all of this and spell this out to Tim. (I haven't listened to his call of last night's game yet, but he seemed quite receptive to what I was saying; he responded by saying how it basically took him 10 years to get him to where he was comfortable blending his British background and accent into calling basketball games in a way he was comfortable with, so it's hardly surprising that he'll take some time to figure out where he's going with hockey.) And it's also instructive for me to think about being on the other side of this, where I was told by DAZN that I'm not employable as a soccer commentator for a Canadian audience which strongly prefers British and Irish accents to American ones.

 

[Conigliaro's Potential]

Crickets in here, I guess...still:

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n6xyHR3t734

An utterly meaningless but quite fun game to call tonight, with Jukurit defeating Sparta Prague 6-3. Sparta led 1-0 and 2-1, but the game turned in the second period when Nikita Krivokrasov - a wonderful name to pronounce, and I remember his father from his time with the Chicago Blackhawks (and Pat Foley's delight in pronouncing his name) - was on the receiving end of vicious hit that appeared to leave him concussed and got the offending player a 5-minute major and game misconduct penalty. Jukurit scored twice on the resultant power play, and they cruised home from there.

Also, the CHL Knockout Stage Draw is coming up on Thursday, and I was asked by my one of my producers in Switzerland to help re-script that. That went well and will have earned me a little extra coin, which is always nice.

 

[GreenMonster49]

Alas, neither the crickets nor I can watch the video. (All we see is the message that the "uploaded has not made this video available in your country.")

 

[Conigliaro's Potential]

FWIW, I'm officially bringing this thread to a close, as I'm stepping away from SoSH for the foreseeable future. To be honest, even if I weren't, I feel like this journal has become rather repetitive and somewhat narcissistic - do people really want to read about yet another hockey or football game in leagues that have no relevance to them? - and as such it's probably a good time to call it quits. But it has been a joy and a privilege to share my commentary journey over the last few years with everyone, and the encouragement I've received from so many of you really has been greatly appreciated.

 

[StupendousMan]

Thanks very much for giving me an inside look into the business of sports commentary! I hope that I'll hear you in the next Olympics

 

[Lose Remerswaal]

I will miss this thread (and you). The "Inside Baseball" posts about the Olympics and similar and about the ways and whys commentators get selected were always fascinating to me. And watching something on TV and saying "hey, I know that guy" was always pretty cool to me.

Just take a look at the "views" and you'll see how popular the thread is

 

[rbeaud]

Thank you @Conigliaro's Potential for this unique glimpse into the world of sportscasting. As one of the many viewers with nothing of value to add onto your diary….it was a very cool thread!

cheers!

 

[GreenMonster49]

Thanks very much for showing us what goes on behind the scenes!

 

[InstaFace]

Likewise, was always a huge fan. Sorry to hear that this thread is rounding third and heading for home. Hope that big break with the NFL is coming soon!

 

[Conigliaro's Potential]

Not that I'm active on SoSH at the moment, but I thought a few of you might be interested to hear that I've recently become part of the EuroCup basketball commentary team (world feed), operating out of IMG's studio complex near Heathrow Airport. I've called four games so far, with another one to come tomorrow night and five more now lined up in March; I've also been asked to call my first two EuroLeague games as well, the first of which is on the 24th of March (Fenerbahce vs. Zalgiris Kaunas), and I get the sense that my American accent could stand me in good stead to rise up the pecking order and get me a lot of work here in the future. Basketball has always been one of my favorite sports to call, and being able to take a step up from the FIBA games I had been calling to the two most prestigious club tournaments in Europe is very exciting. And my producer has given me very positive feedback about what he's heard so far, and also passed that feedback up the food chain...so, yeah, that's all great.

(I'm also off to northern Sweden for the Champions Hockey League Final next Saturday - Luleå vs. Tappara Tampere. Always pleased to be calling games in person, and this should be a pretty even matchup.)

 

[Koufax]

Welcome back and congratulations on your basketball gig. I hope to be reading more of your progress this year.

 

[Lose Remerswaal]

No shit we’d be interested. Cool gig, good for you!

Northern Sweden in midwinter should be … beautiful?

 

[InstaFace]

Always a pleasure hearing where your career has taken you, Darren. Keep us posted, and say hi to Elsa and Anna for us.

 

[Conigliaro's Potential]

Northern Sweden in midwinter should be … beautiful?

I mean, I'm not exactly in Lapland - I'll be at the northern tip of the Baltic Sea, as shown below. I suspect it'll be cold, and probably somewhat charming but not particularly scenic. And it'll take me three flights to get home, via Stockholm and Frankfurt, so that's not exactly ideal. (My wife and I once flew to Tromsø, which is on the very top edge of that map, and took the coastal Norwegian ferry service - the Hurtigruten - down as far as Bergen on holiday; Tromsø is the furthest north I've ever been, but I think this will be the second northernmost destination, even above the likes of Fairbanks, Alaska.)

 

[Conigliaro's Potential]

Here's a totally random one for you: I've been approached by my old colleagues in Vienna - where my commentary journey properly started with the CHL in 2014 - and asked if I can do some Swiss hockey league commentary. So instead of the CHL Final on Saturday being my final hockey game of the season, as is normally the case, I'm now calling ZSC Zurich vs. Geneve-Servette on Tuesday, with more likely to come. This is for C More, the Scandinavian network I'll hopefully have in my hotel room tomorrow night, and it's via Spalk, so something I can do from home. I'd love to get involved in calling playoff games after the regular season ends on the 4th of March, but of course, my EuroLeague and EuroCup bookings continue to fly in - now a total of five games between 7-16 March, and four others after that - and so I'm in the rare position where I may have to turn down some assignments at some point.

Speaking of EuroLeague, the Panathinaikos vs. Valencia game was on UK TV here the other night, and as I've been booked to call a Valencia game, I figured I'd watch...and Spero Dedes was doing the commentary, onsite from Athens. I'd seen his name down on the call sheet that was circulated for all of the games last week, so I asked my scheduling coordinator about it, and apparently he's done a couple of games thus far and is planning to be in Greece a lot next season and hopes to call quite a few Panathinaikos and Olympiakos home games. (His Greek pronunciations are definitely on point!)

 

[Conigliaro's Potential]

I mean, which of these games would you REALLY rather watch???

 

[nayrbrey]

View attachment 61241

I mean, which of these games would you REALLY rather watch???

Hmm tough choice there. Glad to see you posting a bit again.

 

[Mugsy's Jock]

Welcome back, Conig. Really enjoy these updates, and pleased to see how busy you are!

 

[Conigliaro's Potential]

View attachment 61241

I mean, which of these games would you REALLY rather watch???

I mean...I know the latter game finished 5-2 to Real after Liverpool led 2-0, but my ZSC-Geneva game tonight was at least as crazy. It featured two breakaway goals, one of the filthiest assists you'll ever see (a perfectly intentional backheeled pass across the crease with the guy's skate to set up a tap-in which wouldn't have been out of place in a Real Madrid match), a 5+20 boarding penalty by ZSC when they led 5-3 in the third, another penalty which led to a 5-on-3 power play goal to make it 5-4, a ZSC shorthanded goal to make it 6-4, a 6-on-5 goal after Geneva pulled their goalie to make it 6-5, and then one last flurry that failed to tie the game. I'm pretty sure 11 goals is the most goals I've ever called in a competitive game; I may have had a 10-2 or something in the CHL, but that was extraordinary.

That came on the heels of the CHL Final in Luleå on Saturday...and that was something as well. Tappara scored twice in the first seven minutes of the game, and then early in the third they got what was basically an own goal (poked into his own net by a Luleå player) to make it 3-0. That was the only shot on goal Tappara recorded in the third period; Luleå wound up with 22 shots on goal in the third, but it was still 3-0 when they pulled their goalie when skating 4x4 with nine minutes left. Tappara committed a penalty, and Lulea scored a 5-on-3 goal (with their net empty) to make it 3-1. Then Tappara committed two more penalties and Luleå was skating 6x3 but failed to score...but they did pull another goal back at 6-on-5 with 2:10 left, and Tappara grimly hung on from there and just managed to get over the line at 3-2. Even though my trip back to Scotland on Sunday was long as hell (I left our hotel at 7:30 in the morning and didn't get home until just before midnight), it was generally a great experience, even including the fact that I wound up walking from the arena back to the hotel for 25 minutes in the snow after I never found the bus I was looking for. (Luleå was a very pleasant town, and the snow flurries throughout game day on Saturday made for a lovely touch.)

 

[runnels3]

You are going to kill this. Relax and enjoy.

Guy's been to the Isle of Skye. He's always relaxed.

 

[Conigliaro's Potential]

After my Swiss hockey game last night, I've now been hired to call up to 11 Swiss playoff games, including the entirety of the best-of-7 finals series. I've opened myself up to clashes with potential EuroCup and EuroLeague assignments - and in fact I've already backed out of a one-off EuroLeague game I had already agreed to call but which was going to be terribly cost-ineffective for me - but the lure of playoff hockey is just too much for me to resist. Decent pay, staying at home (no time or money spent travelling), and calling the same two teams every other day (with minimal prep required between games) is pretty much perfect; the only other hockey playoffs I've gotten to call was the 2018 Gagarin Cup in the KHL, and the finals that year finished in a four-game sweep, so hopefully this one works out rather better!

I was also WhatsApping with one of my Spalk contacts this evening - he was asking how the hockey game went last night - and apparently Spalk is trying to seal a deal with CONCACAF encompassing internationals (maybe the Nations League?) and club competitions (including the Champions League) that I would be in line to take part in. I can't imagine I'd actually get to call any USMNT games...but still, this would be a welcome route back into soccer commentary for me. Fingers crossed....

 

[Conigliaro's Potential]

Check out this play - at the 1:03 mark of the below highlights video - by Henry Ellison of Joventut Badalona in my commentary game this evening vs. Mincedelice JL Bourg-en-Bresse:

View: https://youtu.be/rt-Xl54YkU4?t=63

Ellenson was a former first-round draft pick of Detroit in 2016 (after a great freshman year at Marquette) but flamed out of the NBA after only 83 regular season games with the Pistons, Knicks, Nets and Raptors...but this was Larry Bird-esque.

By the way, I did a bit of exploring around IMG Studios this evening. Did you know that the studio for CBS/Paramount+'s coverage of the Champions League was just around the corner from where I was working? I was in the same building as Thierry Henry tonight! Also, Amazon Prime's coverage of ATP Indian Wells tennis was next door as well; I took the opportunity to knock on a door and introduce myself to their producer on duty today, and he's now passed my details up the food chain to their commentary coordinators. I may just have to move back to London, really...

 

[Mahkis Smaht]

FWIW, I'm officially bringing this thread to a close, as I'm stepping away from SoSH for the foreseeable future. To be honest, even if I weren't, I feel like this journal has become rather repetitive and somewhat narcissistic - do people really want to read about yet another hockey or football game in leagues that have no relevance to them? - and as such it's probably a good time to call it quits. But it has been a joy and a privilege to share my commentary journey over the last few years with everyone, and the encouragement I've received from so many of you really has been greatly appreciated.

I have enjoyed reading your thread over the years. Even if no one is commenting people are reading, or at least I have been. This is one of the only places you can get stories like this.

I'm sure it's fine if you post more than once a week if you feel. If people were getting mad when this thread floated to the top I'm sure they would have told you by now. Just don't think no one's reading.

 

[Mahkis Smaht]

Also, what is Conigliaro's Potential? I'm assuming it doesn't refer to Conigliario being in a state of thermodynamic non-equilibrium.

 

[Conigliaro's Potential]

I have enjoyed reading your thread over the years. Even if no one is commenting people are reading, or at least I have been. This is one of the only places you can get stories like this.

Thanks for the feedback. (I'm no longer doing a full diary of every game I call, but I have the sense that there's generally enough interest in my work to keep everyone informed at the macro level about what I've been doing, and maybe share some of the more interesting tidbits that come up.)

Also, what is Conigliaro's Potential? I'm assuming it doesn't refer to Conigliario being in a state of thermodynamic non-equilibrium.

Do you know the story of Tony Conigliaro? (His career, essentially struck down in one moment by one pitch, is one of the great what-ifs of baseball history.)

 

[Mahkis Smaht]

Do you know the story of Tony Conigliaro? (His career, essentially struck down in one moment by one pitch, is one of the great what-ifs of baseball history.)

Thanks! I didn't. Is that the whole story? It reminds me, like, what if Ken Griffey Jr could have stayed healthy?

 

[rbeaud]

Thanks for the feedback. (I'm no longer doing a full diary of every game I call, but I have the sense that there's generally enough interest in my work to keep everyone informed at the macro level about what I've been doing, and maybe share some of the more interesting tidbits that come up.)

Hopefully I’m not the only other one to say “yes please”. Your stories are an interesting insight and offer a wholly different perspective on sports.

 

[Conigliaro's Potential]

I'm down in London again this week for three basketball games: two EuroCup games (Paris v Slask Wroclaw and Gran Canaria v Turk Telekom) today and tomorrow, and my first EuroLeague game (Maccabi Tel Aviv v Baskonia) on Thursday. The latter is particularly exciting: it's #1 in the Israeli league vs. #3 in the Spanish ACB, and they're currently #6 and #8 in the EuroLeague table, with the top eight teams making it through to the best-of-five playoff quarterfinals. (And then they switch to a single-game Final Four format for the semifinals and finals, which is super lame but apparently necessary for commercial reasons.) I've certainly been busting my ass to prepare for everything!

Last week I was due to go down to London for two days...or at least I was, until I discovered while finishing up my prep work on one of the two games that instead of my two assignments being scheduled for Tuesday and Wednesday (as I'd been told), they were both taking place on Wednesday at conflicting times. Turns out my scheduler hadn't noticed the change of dates...and it also turns out that I wasn't compensated in any way for the mistake on their part, and I'd done all of my prep work for nothing. (Well, I did share it with the woman who got rescheduled to call the game in my place, and she was very grateful, but still!) I had decided to drive down for that trip, insofar as I was heading back north via a few days in the Lake District, but because I went down for two days instead of one I actually made a net loss on the game in question. And as it happens, there was a pretty decent-sized snowstorm by English standards on Wednesday and Thursday, so it wasn't the most productive or calming trip in any sense. Still, I have been promised an extra Round of 16 EuroCup playoff game as belated compensation if the schedule works out, with an extra EuroLeague game tacked on at the end as well, so hopefully it'll all come out in the wash. Starting today, I could realistically have as many as 20 or 21 games to call between now and the end of April if the Swiss hockey playoff finals go the full seven games, which is about 20 or 21 more than I might have expected to have in that timeframe as of a few months ago...so that's nice.

 

[Conigliaro's Potential]

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rR-w04kkrK8

I'm officially a EuroLeague commentator now. So that's nice! I started with a pretty good game, too, with Maccabi Tel Aviv and Baskonia starting the night part of a four-way tie for 6th place (with a total of eight playoff spots on the line); Maccabi led 40-27 in the 2nd quarter, but it was down to 49-45 at halftime, and then Baskonia opened the second half with a 15-0 run to go up 60-49. And then Maccabi countered with a 14-0 run of its own which became a 32-7 run, and they ultimately cruised to a 14-point win. Very odd.

With EuroLeague, I get a producer counting me down into the various ad breaks and player/coach interviews, etc., instead of having to figure it all out myself as I do in EuroCup games. The pregame is also 15 minutes long instead of 10, so I have more work to do in lining up all of the various segments - I spent most of the morning and part of the afternoon scripting everything out, and by the time we were about to start, I was worrying that I'd over-rehearsed everything. But it all worked out great once I was up and running, and overall I think it was one of my better basketball commentaries, following on from a slightly disappointing performance the night before in the Gran Canaria vs. Turk Telekom EuroCup game. I spent about 90 minutes yesterday chatting with the staffer who books all of the commentators for every EuroLeague and EuroCup game (partly to try to get on her good side) , and she told me that when someone makes their EuroLeague commentary debut, a bunch of producers and other EuroLeague staffers will be paying close attention and will probably be talking about him the next morning, so hopefully I've made a good impression! Frankly, I was delighted to hear that anyone who matters is actually listening to me and judging me, as a) I back myself to do well in situations like that, and b) sadly, there are many organizations where that doesn't happen. Apparently I'm the first person to get a mid-season promotion from EuroCup to EuroLeague commentary work in at least a couple of years, which is particularly good given that I only started in January; my goal now is to become a EuroLeague regular next season and position myself well to become an Olympic basketball commentator for OBS at Paris 2024.

 

[tmracht]

Your journey is so amazing. Hopefully we hear you in 2024!

 

[Conigliaro's Potential]

Your journey is so amazing. Hopefully we hear you in 2024!

Thank you!

By the way, it cracks me up to have found a highlights video with my call of the Maccabi-Baskonia game the other night on Maccabi's YouTube channel that features nothing but Maccabi buckets. There's also this "condensed game" video (13 minutes long) with my call of the game, featuring enough content between scores from both teams to give a pretty holistic sense of what I'm like as a basketball commentator - I do use the verb "drains" too many times, but still, it has gone straight to the top of the basketball page on my commentary website:

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kdiC2wHQx94

 

[Conigliaro's Potential]

My first Swiss playoff game was tonight, Game 4 of the Quarterfinal series between #1 overall seed Geneve-Servette and #10 Lugano (which had to defeat #7 seed Fribourg-Gotteron in the Preliminary Round of the playoffs). You might be amused to note that in smaller countries where inter-city travel isn't lengthy, the higher seed hosts Game 1, 3, 5 and 7 in a best-of-seven series, rather than following the 2-3-2 or 2-2-1-1-1 format like they do in American sports. Well, Game 3 was on Saturday night, and Geneva won toward the end of the 3rd OT in what was the second-longest game in Swiss hockey history, so I had to follow that...and my game tonight went to overtime with the score tied up 1-1. There's nothing better than overtime playoff hockey, right? I definitely remember calling Game 6 of the Gagarin Cup playoff semifinals in the KHL in 2018, when CSKA Moscow defeated SKA St. Petersburg in OT to win the Western Conference series, but I'm not sure I'd called another OT playoff game in a best-of-X series before tonight. I was calling the game at home, and I'd warned my wife and kids during the 3rd intermission that in theory I could still be commentating at midnight or beyond - so of course, Lugano scored 1:09 into OT and won the game just like that.

I was inwardly rooting for Lugano because I'd been given my next two assignments already: for Game 5 on Friday, I'm calling ZSC Zurich vs. HC Davos, while for Game 6 on Sunday - when all four QF series might still be underway - I was told the order in which we've ranked the matches in terms of priority if each series was still going, and Lugano vs. Geneve-Servette was top of the list. There was the possibility that I might need to research two new teams that I hadn't called yet this season, which would have been a real pain amidst all of the other hockey and basketball prep I have to do in the near future, but I now get to call these same two teams again, which will be much more straightforward. Not that calling a game from Lugano off-tube is a piece of cake - the center-ice camera position is very high and feels quite distant from the rink, and the fonts on both teams' jerseys is such that I was having a very difficult time identifying player numbers. But I'd much rather battle that again on Sunday having banked the knowledge of both teams from tonight than have to start afresh.

 

[Conigliaro's Potential]

I finished my current set of Swiss hockey playoff assignments tonight by calling an empty net goal...scored by Geneve-Servette goaltender Robert Mayer. I had just watched a YouTube video of every single goal scored by goalies in NHL history a couple of weeks ago after Linus Ullmark scored for the Bruins, and then it happened in my game tonight! It was a peach, too - Mayer was in his crease when he received the puck, with his team having just scored another empty-netter to take a 4-2 lead with less than a minute left, and he elevated it perfectly down the ice and into the empty net to clinch the series for Geneve-Servette, 4 games to 2. So that was fun. (I'll be back to call Finals Game 1 on April 14, after first calling two more EuroLeague and four more EuroCup basketball games.)