WAYNE NORMAN
The longtime color analyst is a walking encyclopaedia of UConn basketball and football
by Elizabeth McGuire
Hartford Magazine, March 2005
Ask Wayne Norman for just about any statistic from any game this UConn men’s basketball or football teams have played in the past 25 years and no doubt he’ll know it. And if by chance he doesn’t have total recall, he can easily find the answer by reaching into the bag he carries with him to every game. Inside the bag are detailed handwritten records on every basket, touchdown, foul and fumble since 1989.
“It’s a lot to carry around, but there have already been about six times this {season} when I could quicklly look up some point of reference stat to be used on the air,” says Norman.
Norman, 56, has been the color analyst for UConn basketball and football games for more than two decades. “I really enjoy not just watching the teams but trying to do the best job I can to paint the mental picture–the word picture–for the listener,” says Norman.
His longtime colleague UConn play-by-play announcer Joe D’Ambrosio says Norman works hard to accomplish that. “He’s passionate about the game and making every broadcast the best that it can be,” says D’Ambrosio.
Norman began his association with UConn in 1979 when he filled in for Scott Gray during a football game against Navy. In 1980, when Gray began working for WTIC-AM, Norman was offered the job full time. He accepted but didn’t go on the air until 1981 because of a throat ailment that left him sounding, as he says, “like a foghorn.” The radio network that broadcast the games held the position for him while he underwent voice therapy. In September, Norman called his 1,000th game on the UConn Radio Network during the football team’s first Big East home game at Rentschler Field against Pittsburgh.
Norman started following UConn basketball and football while a student on the Storrs campus in 1966, long before Jim Calhoun, Geno Auriemma, and Randy Edsall began coaching. Norman says of his long history with the teams both as fan and analyst: “I think that seeing so many teams and so many players gives you a better feeling of what the team is trying to accomplish–when they are having a good day, when they are having a bad day.”
Norman says that he and D’Ambrosio do their best to remain impartial. “Somoe broadcasters get the tag of being a ‘homer,’ where you are only supposed to talk the positives and not the negatives of what’s going on. We’ve never subscribed to that,” says Norman.
From September to March, Norman is consumed with UConn football and basketball. When he’s not on the road or in the air traveling to or fro a game, he’s watching the teams practice and studying facts and figures about the teams and their players. When he’s analyzing the games though, Norman does much more than just rattle off figures. “My job is to try to think of why things are working or why things aren’t working. To notice changing defenses, to make the stats tell the story,” Norman explains.
As much time as Norman spends on preparing, travelling, and analyzing games, it is only a part-time job. Norman’s full-time job is host for the state’s longest running morning radio show. Every weekday, unless he worked an out-of-town game the night before, he is up before 5 a.m. to host the show on WILI-AM in Willimantic.
His interest in radio began during his freshman year at UConn, although he does admit to playing radio deejay in his bedroom when he was about 13. He worked at the campus radio station while he tried to figure out what to major in at the school. He started with aeronautical engineering, switched to math and then settled on business. His first job after college was WADS-AM in Ansonia. Then in 1970, WILI hired him for the station’s afternoon show. “I packed up my 1961 Chevy Impala and said, ‘Bye, Mom,'” remembers Norman. After a short time at the station, management asked him to host the morning show, temporarily. That was 34 years ago.
In eastern Connecticut, where Norman works and lives, he is a local celebrity. He’s often recognized when he’s out running errands, often by folks who want to talk sports. “It is difficult going to the supermarket and you’re in the frozen food department and they want to hear about last night’s UConn loss,” says Norman, adding that he doesn’t really mind because he likes to hear other people’s stories–something he loves about radio work.
He likes to tell stories as well. Among his favorites are about places he’s been. Norman has traveled all over the world. His most memorable trip included a 50-mile round trip hike with four friends into and out of the Grand Canyon in 2002. “There are few experiences in my life that can compare to reaching the rim on that last day. There was just an incredible feeling of euphoria when we got to that rim,” he says.
Looking at Norman’s tall, lanky physique, you would assume that he played basketball in high school or college. But he didn’t. But he says he was a pretty good baseball player. Baseball is still one of his favorite sports, and he does play-by-play for Eastern Connecticut State University’s baseball team and is a Red Sox season ticket holder. He also spends a fair amount of time watching baseball on TV. “I pay $60 a month for cable for three things: baseball, weather, and David Letterman.”
From time to time in the past, Norman says he thought about taking a radio job in a larger market. But now, looking back at how the UConn basketball and football programs have grown, he’s glad he stayed. “One of the key reasons that I’ve stayed here for 34-and-a-half years is the UConn job. It’s a job I love. If I were to go somewhere else, I’d have to leave this behind. I’m happy with having been a big part of that.”
STORIES FROM STORRS
In March, Norman’s book HOOP TALES: UCONN HUSKIES MEN’S BASKETBALL, which he co-authored with longtime friend Robert Porter about the history of UConn basketball, will be published by Globe-Pequot Press.
