For George Mason University’s men’s basketball radio announcer Bill Rohland, the game is his life.
Rohland started his radio career working for WGMU radio as a student in 1989 and has been in the business ever since.
“I had friends from high school who were older than me who were working at the campus radio station and they were calling the men’s games for the campus radio station,” Rohland said. “I said I wanted to get involved, but of course it’s kind of a hierarchy thing. The upperclassmen were doing it and freshman and sophomores weren’t really allowed. So I said, ‘Well, what about women’s games?’ So I started doing those.”
Rohland began calling games for the women’s basketball team on the campus radio station. They played their home games in the old Linn Gym before moving to the Patriot Center.
“It was one of those things where if someone was shooting a free throw, you couldn’t talk because there was maybe 50 people in the place and everyone could hear you talking.”
Through calling women’s games, Rohland gained the experience and the connections needed to call men’s basketball games. His passion for sports and writing were also influential in his career choice of sports radio.
“I wrote for my high school paper when I was in school and loved it and I always thought that I wanted to do that,” Rohland said.
Rohland’s love for sports and writing were the primary motives for his shift to radio.
“At the time, you couldn’t just write something, hit send and it was suddenly up on your blog or website for everybody to read. You had to wait to see what people think of it. I fell in love with the immediacy of [radio],” Rohland said.
After graduating from Mason, Rohland spent time as a game-day producer, analyst for the Washington Wizards and a Sports Talk 980 anchor. He also worked as a sports anchor for CBS Sports. In 1999, Rohland caught his break and started calling games as a color analyst for the Patriots and was selected as the play-by-play announcer soon after.
He had obtained his dream job as the voice of the Patriots.
Rohland, who has a radio show on 106.7 The Fan, said that he would love to continue working at Mason for another 20-25 years before handing over his job to someone else.
“It’s such a different feel here at Mason having been involved with school since ’89 in one form or another,” Rohland said.
“It’s a big school but it’s a small school in the sense that [it has that] kind of family connection when you’re involved in the athletic department and the program. I can’t imagine calling games for another school.”
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