North Dakota State athletics has had some great radio voices over the years from the “My Oh My” moments of the late Scott Miller to the exciting calls of Jeff Culhane. Those men gave the most exciting moments in Bison history a voice and this past spring NDSU hired a new “Voice of the Bison” in Sam Neidermann. Neidermann previously was the voice of Stony Brook University in New York, he has also worked games for ESPN and Westwood One radio. I interviewed Sam to ask him about his career and what it’s like to be the new voice of Bison football and basketball.
What made you interested in sports broadcasting?
“I guess I got interested in sports broadcasting once I realized I wasn’t gonna be a professional athlete because I grew up playing sports. Like many of us love playing football, basketball, baseball, especially. But once I realized that my God-given abilities weren’t gonna take me to the NFL or the MLB or whatnot. I figured the next best thing to do would be to talk sports and to broadcast them. So that’s how I got into it. And I always just liked, like calling games for fun, whether it be like video games you played or playing in the backyard with your friends, kind of pretending to call the game and it sort of took off and I decided to get serious about pursuing it and then here we are.
What is your style as a broadcaster?
“Lot of different things I would say I’m very network sound. And, and in many ways, I look at play-by-play guys as quarterbacks or pitchers, right? And like you wanna use a quarterback analogy, I’m a little more of a pocket passer, you know. I, I’m very kind of that professional sound with an aggressive twist, you know, I, I think I get pretty aggressive, pretty technical, pretty detailed. Use a lot of tempo in terms of my delivery and cadence. But also pretty explosive when, when it comes to, you know, some of those bigger moments. So that’s kind of what I’ve always tried to blend is an aggressiveness with an attention to detail on the technical side of things when it comes to a radio call, with an explosiveness that you would hear on some like a hometown call like a Paul Allen or, you know, Wayne Larrivee, you know, with the Green Bay Packers, I think those guys do a great job with that. So I guess if I had to describe my style, it’s a very professional sounding with a lot of attention to detail, you know, you’re always gonna get, I found on my calls I always like to include a lot of just storylines and nuggets that might be lying beneath the surface that I think the audience you know, would, would like to hear. So, that’s how I would describe it. I, I would say it’s pretty, pretty network sounding call that that’s kind of always how I’ve sort of found the sound”.
What appealed to you about the Bison job?
“Well, right when the job came open, I thought, man, that’s a sick opportunity. I mean, it was, it jumped off the page. I was like, that’s a historic program, championship-caliber program. I love college football. I love doing games on the radio. It felt like a great match for my skill set and experience at the time. So I said, let’s go for it. I was blown away when I first came here during the interview process. Like I was sold like this is a place to be and this is an awesome opportunity. The brand of North Dakota State, you know, being somebody from the outside, I’ve been aware of it for years now with the dynasty that buys and fans have all witnessed. So it’s a humbling opportunity opportunity to it. It has been humbling to be a part of this thing for the last 2.5 months because every day, I kind of learn a little bit more about the pedigree here and the tradition and the history and there’s a new story every day to be learned with this football program and this university as a whole and all of its athletics so feel really blessed to have the opportunity and thank God it worked out, you know, God put me here for a reason. I’m just excited to see what unfolds.”
What are you looking forward to most about the upcoming NDSU basketball season?
“Oh, dude, I can’t wait, I can’t wait. I’m just looking forward to being around Coach Richman, the staff, the players, and kind of the culture that’s been in place there. I love basketball, especially college basketball growing up in Indiana. It’s huge. So, just to be in the trenches with these guys who I’m looking forward to personally. And then from a team standpoint, I’m really excited to see how much of a leap they took from last year to this year because it was a really young team last year. So, yeah. Yeah. No, they’ll, they’ll find a way to replace Grant. I think a little more as a collective. Everything kind of ran through him last year. I think his departure in some ways almost allows for some other players to step up and shine, but yeah, some of the “baby bison”, as their nickname last year who played as freshmen. I can’t wait to see what they look like to Damari Wheeler Thomas, to Trajavis Miller, those guys. It sounds like they’ve taken good steps in the offseason and, I’m hoping that this team can get back to the NCAA tournament, man. I mean, it’s been a minute. They’ve been close, five straight Summit League championship games but haven’t been to the tourney since 2019. So, this is a group that is obviously one of the top teams in the conference and has been to NCAA tournaments frequently in the last decade, but I’m excited to see what kind of bite they have in terms of getting back to the standard of going to the Big Dance.”
Full interview with Sam can be found on my social media accounts and YouTube channel, @granthubbard_pxp.