For the upcoming 2015 football season, the University of Saskatchewan Huskies will have a new broadcast partner on the radio, come gamedays.

On March 25, it was announced that Huskie Athletics and the Saskatoon Media Group reached a five-year radio broadcast deal that will see all Huskies football games — including preseason, regular season and playoffs — broadcast live on CJWW, which can be found on 600 AM locally. The broadcast will include an hour long pre-game show as well as a 30-minute post-game show.

Athletic director Basil Hughton was thrilled to announce the new deal.

“We are excited to start this new partnership with Saskatoon Media Group,” said Hughton at a press conference on March 25. “Huskie football is an important part of the Saskatoon and Saskatchewan community and we are proud to be featured on Saskatchewan’s most listened to radio station, CJWW.”

Play-by-plays of the games will be done by Dave Thomas, who currently works as the host of the CJWW morning show and also called Saskatoon Blades hockey games for nine seasons alongside Les Lazaruk. Joining Thomas in the booth as the colour commentator will be a Huskie football alumnus and a sideline reporter to provide an even better game day experience for the listener.

For students, this will make accessing information and keeping up with the Huskies even easier. Fans who are unable to attend home games now have a better platform to listen to the green and white, as well as all fans who wish to listen to the team’s road games and can’t travel to see them play.

The move to Saskatchewan’s most listened-to radio station is a positive development for the Huskie football program, as they will receive more exposure and coverage, which in turn will hopefully draw new fans to the team in this football-crazed province.

Saskatoon Media Group general manager Vic Dubois was also very excited to announce the agreement.

“It is an understatement to say we are huge football fans here at Saskatoon Media Group, as for many years we have broadcast the games of the Saskatchewan Roughriders and Saskatoon Hilltops,” Dubois said at the same press conference. “What we have been missing is the top-notch action of [Canadian Interuniversity Sport] football and our always competitive U of S Huskies. We are very excited that now Huskie football will be heard on CJWW for years to come.”

Saskatoon Media Group is a multi-platform media company responsible for the radio stations 600 CJWW, 98Cool FM, 92.9 The Bull CKBL-FM as well as the Internet information page, saskatoonhomepage.ca.

Huskies football games were previously aired on CK750 with Brenden Crowe and Kelly Bowers calling the action. Bowers was inducted into the Saskatoon Sports Hall of Fame in 2011 for his contributions to the city in basketball and football and has been the voice of the Huskies football team since 1998.

The Huskies join the University of British Columbia Thunderbirds and the University of Regina Rams as the only teams in Canada West football to have all of their games broadcast live on the radio. The University of Calgary Dinos and the University of Alberta Golden Bears currently do not have broadcast partners, while the University of Manitoba Bisons only have their home games aired.

With a new broadcast outlet, the Dogs will look to hopefully end their recent run of poor playoff performances. Saskatchewan hasn’t won a post-season contest since 2009 when they defeated the Rams 53–23 in the semifinals, before dropping a heartbreaker to Calgary, 39–38, in the Hardy Cup. The win over Regina was the squad’s lone playoff win since 2006.

The schedule for the upcoming season has not yet been released.

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Image: Jeremy Britz