COMMENTARY

Ex-Centerville, OSU QB Herbstreit has dream to be Vitale of college football

Former Centerville High School and Ohio State standout and current ESPN college football analyst Kirk Herbstreit signs a mini OSU helmet during an autograph session at the Sonny Unger Foundation Program in 2008. Staff photo by Jim Witmer

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By Dave George, Cox Newspapers Updated 8:06 AM Wednesday, August 25, 2010

WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. — Who is the face of college football? Like every other sweeping question in sports today, that is for ESPN to decide.

In this case, the network has chosen well, plucking Kirk Herbstreit from a long-ago audition tape and systematically positioning the former Ohio State and Centerville High School quarterback for decades of racing around the country as an eyewitness, an ambassador, a mirror of the game.

All the guy’s missing is a catchphrase or two and — Whoa, Nelly! — we may be thinking of him in 20 years the way we do of Keith Jackson.

How did it happen? Well, other than the fact that Herbstreit is very smooth and natural on camera and knows the game instinctively, there is his age, 41, and his passion for the chaos and the fun of a Saturday stadium on red alert, which should be good for another 41 years.

As for ESPN’s role in setting the American weekend agenda, they and the parent ABC network own the rights to the BCS bowls and the national championship game, plus a couple of prime-time Saturday showcase games per week, plus a new 15-year deal with the almighty Southeastern Conference.

That last one with Division I’s glamour conference goes for $2.25 billion all by itself, a pretty fair indicator of how important it was for Herbstreit to find a space on this runaway broadcast locomotive, even if it was originally the caboose.

“I was doing local radio (in Columbus) and I put this little tape together, never thinking I would hear anything back,” said Herbstreit. “I went in for an audition (at ESPN) back in 1995 and, other than being interviewed in the locker room after games, I had never been on that side of the camera.”

Long story short, Herbstreit flew to ESPN headquarters in Connecticut, logged three minutes of play-by-play simulation work behind a “SportsCenter” desk and headed home for seven months of silence from the network honchos. When the phone finally rang, it was to offer a job as sideline reporter. Herbstreit jumped at it enthusiastically, just as he did the “College GameDay” gig that came along the following year.

“My goal when I started on ‘GameDay’ was to one day be looked at in the same way that Dick Vitale is looked at in college basketball,” Herbstreit said.

Actually, that’s a little too Lee Corso for my taste. With all the clowning that goes on at ESPN, all the driving of public opinion on which teams are truly worthy on a minute-by-minute basis, it might be better for Herbstreit to stay focused on the facts, no matter who likes it. That’s how his dad, former Ohio State assistant coach Jim Herbstreit, always operated, and so did the Buckeyes’ ultimate boss, Woody Hayes.

When Miami heads to Ohio State on Sept. 11 Herbstreit won’t be calling for a Buckeyes blowout, the way his neighbors in Columbus would want it.

“These two teams met not only in 2002, which everyone remembers, but also in 1999, at East Rutherford,” Herbstreit said. “It was when Butch Davis was trying to get Miami up and out of probation and they had an opportunity in that Kickoff Classic to show America that the ‘U’ was back. They took advantage of it and won the game (23-12).

“I feel like Miami’s on the verge of some great, great times and I think they need a game like Ohio State to show the country, and to show themselves, where they are.”

The face of college football is smiling as he speaks, which can only mean that a new season is upon us.

Aren’t you smiling, too?

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