Before landing a job as the lead studio host for the Big Ten Network in 2007, Northwestern alumnus Dave Revsine (WCAS ’91) worked for WNUR and enjoyed NU sports and campus life. He spoke with THE DAILY about staying objective when the Cats play, putting the writing skills he learned at NU into practice and becoming a successful sportscaster.Excerpts:
The Daily: Were you involved with sports reporting at NU?Revsine: I did WNUR. I did play-by-play for them on football and basketball broadcasts. I wanted to be a sportscaster since I was 5 or 6 years old. I realized I wasn’t going to be an athlete pretty early on-at least not a pro one-so sports broadcasting seemed like the next best thing to do.The Daily: What were you like at Northwestern?Revsine: I was a lot like how I am now, to be honest. I loved Northwestern; I have a real passion for the place and thoroughly enjoyed my time there. Most of my close friends are college friends and the people I’m in communication with every single day are from NU, which is amazing considering we were there almost 20 years ago.The Daily: How do you think NU prepared you for your current job?Revsine: I would say it helped me get a great foundation and learn how to think critically. I learned how to write, which was important especially for my time at ESPN. When you’re hosting SportsCenter, you do your own writing. It’s odd because there’s no direct correlation between the classes I took there and what I do now, but NU was invaluable.The Daily: The Big Ten Tournament is coming up and there’s also March Madness. How do you cover major events like that?Revsine: This is definitely an important time for us. The Big Ten Tournament-that’s the culmination of our year unless we get a team to the Final Four, in which case we cover that intensively. For the Tournament, though, we have a studio set up in Indy. We basically take our entire studio production and move it down there and do our pregame coverage, our postgame coverage. We’re able to do all that there.The Daily: Is there ever any trouble remaining objective when NU is playing?Revsine: You know, not only did I go to Northwestern, but my father taught in Kellogg, and both my parents went there so I have deep ties to NU. But it’s my job to be professional, and I feel allegiances to all 11 schools. We work with the coaches and get to know them, and whenever something positive happens for them, I feel good. There’s obviously a part of me that wants to see NU do well, but you reach a point in your career where you know the right way to conduct yourself and that’s what you have to do on the air. I get the reaction from my buddies who say I end up going the other direction and am too hard on Northwestern. They say I go out of my way not to see through the NU lens. I try to present both sides in the Big Ten games. Now, in the non-conference games I get to be completely partisan. The Daily: Any advice for students who hope to break into sports reporting?Revsine: Go for it and pursue your passion. Do what you want to do, but make sure you always have options and ways you can steer your life in other directions if you find that you need to.[email protected]
