GRAND FALLS-WINDSOR, N.L. — As a play-by-play announcer, George Scott’s voice is his main tool.
And, like any tool, the Grand Falls-Windsor broadcaster has to keep it sharp.
The key is pacing himself during a broadcast. Scott only pushes his voice to its highest when it's called for by the moment.
If it doesn't, he keeps his voice at conversational level, a practice for which he's become known.
“Luckily, so far it has held up,” said Scott.
“It can’t be all-in, all excitement all of the time!"
He takes a story-telling approach to his games and wants to give his audience a sense of game flow. He likes to add in some anecdotes.
He’ll talk to players and team officials before games, and does internet research as the need arises.
During international ball hockey games, he would often take a hand recorder and ask team representatives to go through their rosters and pronounce all of their player names.
“It can’t be all-in, all excitement all of the time,” said Scott.
Through his decade broadcasting senior hockey, it has become hard to picture the game without Scott.
From his various perches in rinks across the province, he has been there for Herder championships, the controversial goal that won the CeeBees their last championship and plenty of big games.
He’s had to search more than once for a wireless signal inside an old arena or called a game from a spot where he couldn’t see all of the ice.
It's hard to find a point in the last decade where Scott and senior hockey don’t intersect.
It wouldn’t be a stretch to call Scott the voice of senior hockey in Newfoundland and Labrador. It is a title he holds in a couple of sports.
A high ranking ball hockey officials once called him the voice of ball hockey.
Either title is still strange to hear for Scott.
Senior hockey
Scott found himself in an unexpected place during his first year of senior hockey broadcasting.
The Grand Falls-Windsor Cataracts were playing the Conception Bay North CeeBees in the 2011 Herder Memorial final at Mile One Centre in St. John’s.
He and broadcast partner Barry Manuel were calling the game from the Bob Cole Media Centre.
“We’re looking out over the ice and wondering how in the earth did we ever end up here?” said Scott. “This was not what we expected when we started just a few months ago.”
For Scott, that journey started 13 years earlier when he worked for a local television station. He started calling games for the annual Jones Shield series between St. Michael's and Grand Falls Academy.
“I remember listening to the games on the radio growing up and thinking that would be so cool."
The Shield ended in 1997 and after another year or so at the station, Scott put his sports broadcasting career on pause.
The pause ended in 2010, when he was approached to do an audiocast for the Cataracts.
His first broadcast was from the Hodder Memorial Recreation Complex in Deer Lake and the rest, as they say, is history.
“I remember listening to the games on the radio growing up and thinking that would be so cool,” said Scott.
It would be an understatement to call the last couple of years of Newfoundland senior hockey tumultuous.
Between teams getting kicked out, the constant question of the league’s viability and competitive imbalances, there hasn’t been a great sense of stability outside of the Avalon East Senior Hockey League.
In central, questions about when the Gander Flyers or the Grand Falls-Windsor Cataracts would start up were thought to have been answered. Then the scheduled 12 games were cancelled after Gander folded due to a lack of player commitment.
“Barry (Manuel) once told, ‘It's Newfoundland senior hockey, you don’t know what's going to happen until the teams hit the ice',” said Scott.
More than ice hockey
As a broadcaster, Scott isn’t a one-trick pony.
He isn’t confined to just one sport. In his broadcasting career, he expanded into professional basketball with the St. John’s Edge and he’s been called ball hockey both internationally and across the country.
You might call Scott a branch of the Steve Power broadcasting tree. Power has been providing play-by-play for a number of sports in the metro region and is a man Scott thanks for helping him get into other sports.
When Power was off for a couple of Edge games, he suggested Scott fill in.
A basketball fan at heart, it was an exceptional thrill for the broadcaster.
When he needed an English speaking play-by-play man for an international ball hockey event overseas, Power — president of the Canadian Ball Hockey Association — made his first and only call to Scott.
His schedule this year isn’t a slow one. Aside from the local senior hockey circuit, Scott will be heading to Corner Brook in the spring for the Major Midget AAA Atlantics, as well as some ball hockey excursions this summer.
“Ten years ago, I didn’t see any of this coming,” he said. “I’ve enjoyed every minute of it. All of these things just keep snowballing.”
