Ken Wilson (sportscaster)

Ken Wilson (born October 20, 1947) is an American

Wilson was born in

While attending graduate school, Wilson worked as a disc jockey at KKUA in Honolulu. He landed a play-by-play position with the AAA Hawaii Islanders in 1970, working with Al Michaels. During a seven-year stretch living in Hawaii (1970-1976), he not only did play-by-play for the Islanders, but became sports director of the NBC affiliate in Honolulu, called University of Hawaii basketball games on radio and TV, and did play-by-play of high school football and basketball on radio. Wilson coined the term "Fabulous Five" to describe the all-black Hawaii basketball starting five that played in the NIT and the NCAA tournament during the early 1970s. In his memoir, Dreams from My Father, President Barack Obama recalled coming of age during that time, watching this group. Two decades later the name was resurrected at the University of Michigan during the Chris Webber and Jalen Rose era. Wilson also called Cincinnati Swords (American Hockey League) games from 1972-1974. In 1974 he developed one of the first sports talk radio shows in the United States, Hawaii Sports Huddle.^[2] In 1976 he received acclaim as Hawaii Sportscaster of the Year, prior to moving on to become the first announcer for the Seattle Mariners, along with Dave Niehaus, in 1977.

Hockey play-by-play

In 1986, he became the play-by-play announcer of the NHL on ESPN in the regular season, working primarily with Bill Clement and called the 1986 Stanley Cup Finals.^[3] In 1987, on ESPN, he called Rendez-vous '87 in Quebec City, an international hockey series between the Soviet National Team and the NHL All-Stars. From 1988–1992, he called NHL games on SportsChannel America, partnered with Herb Brooks. He also did hockey play-by-play for the 1990 Goodwill Games on TBS, working with John Davidson.^[4]

After spending two seasons as the television voice of the Chicago Blackhawks (1982–1984), working with Dale Tallon, he was approached by Anheuser-Busch, then part owner of the Sports Time Cable Network, to move from covering the Blackhawks to the St. Louis Blues to partner with play-by-play announcer Dan Kelly. He called his first St. Louis Blues game on October 11, 1984, a 4–2 Blues win in Calgary.^[2] He called one of the greatest games in St. Louis Blues history, known as the Monday Night Miracle, during the 1986 playoffs.^[5][6][7][8] His association as the Blues' play-by-play announcer continued to grow stronger after that. After Kelly's death, he became the team's TV play-by-play announcer with former Blues players Joe Micheletti,^{[9][10][11][12][13][14][15][16]} Bruce Affleck,^[17][18] and Bernie Federko.^[19] He earned the Missouri Sportscaster of the Year award in 2001, along with four Mid-America Emmy Awards for play-by-play. After the 2003–04 NHL season, when his contract ended after calling 1,556 National Hockey League games, he moved back to Honolulu.^[20][21][22]

Baseball play-by-play

After broadcasting baseball at the

While working in Seattle, Wilson did play-by-play for Seattle Pacific University basketball and later was the radio voice of Washington State University basketball.

During his time at Sports Time, Wilson called the U.S. Olympic Basketball Team game against a team of NBA stars, played at the Hoosier Dome in Indianapolis, Indiana on July 9, 1984. The crowd of 67,678 was the largest crowd to see a basketball game in the U.S. at the time.

Wilson was also the Sports Time voice of Big 8 basketball (1984–85), partnering with Lucius Allen.

During the 1990s, he did boxing, Friday Night Ringside, with

In 1997, Wilson purchased the Zanesville (Ohio) Baseball Club of the independent Frontier League and moved the club to the western suburbs of St. Louis. He formed an investor group and served as managing partner of the River City Rascals, until selling his interest in 2004. He helped form a second group that purchased a Frontier League expansion team in 2000. That club began play in 2001 in the eastern suburbs of St. Louis as the Gateway Grizzlies. Wilson sold his ownership interest in that club in 2013.

When he moved back to Honolulu in 2004, he spent a year as a reporter on KHON-TV, prior to opening Mama's Island Pizza in 2005.^[24][25] Along with his wife, Wilson operated the restaurant until February 2008.

In 2008, Wilson became president of the

In 2015, Wilson became owner and operator of the

In 2020 he founded the Women's Collegiate Softball League in Portland, Oregon, to begin play with the All-Star Softball Festival in July, 2022. Following the All-Star Softball Festival it was decided to disband the league.

References