3 Guys Before The Game - Bill McKenzie Visits (Episode 639) - 3 Guys Before The Game

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:12):
Showtime in the University City. We welcome you in. This
is three Guys before the Game. And have I ever
said we got a good one for you? First time
I ever said that. Let me just tell you something. Huh,
I got a dandy, I got a classic. I got
a good one for you. Bill McKenzie is our guest

(00:32):
on three Guys Before the Game. Yes, that Bill McKenzie.
Three Guys Before the Game is brought to us by
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(00:55):
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(01:15):
dot com. Some speculation that Bill McKenzie took a took
a Lou Wendell boat up the Mon River to come
into the stadium. Back in seventy five, the day hit.
We're gonna try to confirm that three guys brought to
us by Tutors Biscuit World starts your day the homemade
way with a Tutor's Biscuit and by Conley's CPA group,

(01:36):
providing value beyond numbers. All right, let's jump on in.
Great to have you here with us. As you know,
if you're a regular. During our summer season, we try
to bring people together names that we oftentimes talk about
that we just don't have the time to get to

(01:57):
when the football and basketball seasons are underway. When this
time of the year comes, we go like, okay, now
we can finally sit down with some folks and spend
a considerable chunk of time with them just to kind
of like what's going on sometimes to confirm stories that
you know, become sometimes urban legend. And we finally get

(02:18):
him here and we say, okay, true or not true?
We learn right, and we are thrilled to have Bill
McKenzie with us. He I don't want to go over
my skis here what you're about to, but I'm going to.
I don't want to get over my skis and Hoppy,
I want you to kind of you guys were basically
in school together, you and Bill. But like, so I've

(02:39):
been here for this will be coming up forty two years,
so I have had a rich full dosage of Mountaineer
sports and Mountaineer history. I in my brain think that
your name is one of about five names in the

(03:02):
history of West Virginia sports across the board that what
forever reason is just iconic. It's just like it's gonna
be fifty years this year that you hit your field
goal to beat Pitt, and yet for some reason it's
like fifty days ago and people just go like Bill McKenzie,
It's like it's this, it's a it's a it's a

(03:24):
foundational pillar in West Virginia sports history.

Speaker 2 (03:28):
Agree, hop, Oh absolutely. I think that's well said in
that it is just synonymous with Mountaineer sports history, not
just football history. And I was thinking coming in because
how many times and it's great to see Bill in person.
I look forward to hearing his stories is how many
times in my lifetime because he and I are about
the same age. I have a reference like Bill McKenzie.

(03:50):
Bill McKenzie, you know, I've only met him in person
maybe once or twice. But it's it is, it's just
it's just amazing, which is one of my questions I
have for him. But I will into that. I don't
want to be right.

Speaker 1 (04:02):
I think your question my question are going to be
kind of the same, like do you have any idea
that that exists?

Speaker 3 (04:11):
Not yes and no. I guess uh. You know, we're
in Arizona. We've been in Arizona for quite a long time,
off and on probably for almost twenty years, full time
for a seven or eight, so I you know, I
don't get that much here. The people out there have
heard the stories, or they'll get on I think it's

(04:33):
YouTube and they'll talk about it and somebody will say,
you know, have you seen this? So that I don't
have a huge group of golfing guys, but there's probably
twenty five or thirty that and every time a new
guy comes up, they're going to say, you have to
see he's a legend in Western you have to see
the YouTube video. So you know, I pick up a

(04:53):
stray another following guy or following person. I guess every
every couple months.

Speaker 1 (04:59):
Yeah, you're you're you're kind of like the musician who
like even though like they go back to your old stuff, like, well,
I never knew that existed, that guy like, and you
just keep it keeps gaining, You just keep gaining.

Speaker 4 (05:09):
I mean we still play the hit every night part
of two.

Speaker 5 (05:12):
Right, how long have we been had that open?

Speaker 1 (05:15):
Thirteen years?

Speaker 5 (05:15):
Fourteen years now.

Speaker 1 (05:16):
Every single night sports line that's part of the opening
of our for those So there are obviously younger people
that are watching listening to this. So just in case
you don't know, the significance this is to me is
the marriage of two of the most iconic things in
WV sports history, one the voice of Jack Fleming and

(05:41):
Bill's kick. He referenced YouTube, so it is available on YouTube.
So if our producer, Jake, if you would Buddy fire
that up end of the West Virginia pit game nineteen
seventy five, roll that bean video if you were.

Speaker 6 (05:57):
Four seconds on a stop fuck, Holy Mac, can you
believe this? Bill McKenzie is on. He is two for
five in field goal from the twenty eighth. It will
be a thirty eight yard of ten. The snap McKenzie
pitchs it in is long.

Speaker 7 (06:17):
Enough, McKenzie picks it.

Speaker 2 (06:20):
It is good.

Speaker 3 (06:21):
The ball game is over.

Speaker 7 (06:22):
McKenzie kicks a.

Speaker 6 (06:24):
Thirty eight yard field goal in.

Speaker 7 (06:26):
A final playing a football game. There's a mob seen
out on the field.

Speaker 6 (06:30):
Come out in theirs, come out to their fans.

Speaker 2 (06:33):
What a mob seeing?

Speaker 7 (06:34):
You haven't seen anything like it. Bill McKenzie kicks a
thirty eight yard field goal on the final player the
football games West Virginia, moving the ball down to the
twenty two and a half yard line on a pastor
Radney Swinson, and then the field goal drive by McKenzie.

Speaker 6 (06:54):
I can't believe it.

Speaker 7 (06:55):
McKenzie, the sophomore from Horwood when the thing is kicking
the shot career all right?

Speaker 1 (07:01):
So there it is a marriage made in football.

Speaker 2 (07:05):
Don't forget that. I'm sure Bill would either about Greg Dorn,
who was the snapper, absolutely, and who was the holder?

Speaker 3 (07:13):
Yes, yes, absolutely, And Tommy and I are on the
bottom of that pile just trying to breathe.

Speaker 1 (07:19):
You've seen it countless times, you've heard it countless times.
But when you watch it now, is it just is
it just?

Speaker 3 (07:27):
It still gives me chickensk I got chicken skin right now?
You still do still give chicken skin.

Speaker 1 (07:32):
That's awesome.

Speaker 3 (07:32):
I can't believe it either. I know Jack Flemings. I
would have loved to talk to him and say, what,
just what part of that didn't you believe that I
was going to make it, or that we came back,
or what part of that didn't you believe? But yeah, no,
I still get still get chicken skin.

Speaker 4 (07:48):
That does it feel like it was fifty years ago?
It feels like it was ten years ago. What's the
timeframe when you see that?

Speaker 3 (07:54):
It doesn't it feels well? Again, I've seen it, and
don't take us wrong. I mean I've seen it a
lot of time, and especially as I was talking about
my golfing buddies, sure you know, every time one of
them brings it up, it's like, yeah, okay, I've seen
it a lot, but it does seem not fifty or
not fifty years away.

Speaker 2 (08:13):
Right Hey, Bill, I want to read you from a
story at w Athletics did in two thousand and seven
about it. Mountaineer coach Bobby Bowden was looking for some
reassurance from Frank Nestor, a reliable kicker for Balden for
two years, who earlier was now serving as one of

(08:34):
the assistants. Frank asked Bowden, can Mackenzie make the kick well? Coached,
Nestor said, hedging his bets certainly within his range. But
that's all I'm going to say.

Speaker 3 (08:48):
Yeah, Frank was a great help. And I guess if
you talked to so I don't remember this, but if
you talk to some of the other people the practice
before the game, I guess I was anything but good
at field goals. So they were all probably, yeah, had
their fingers crossed or close their eyes or covered their
head or something when that came up. But Frank was

(09:11):
a big help.

Speaker 1 (09:12):
When you look back, and I think what makes this
story even better is when you start to dig back,
you were not a high school kicker. You were a
quarterback defensive back. Correct, That was you were known and
for those two positions.

Speaker 3 (09:27):
Correct. Yes, But again, one year we ended up I
think with seventeen kids on our high school team. I
think the most we ever had. We might have had twenty
two one.

Speaker 2 (09:38):
Year at Warwood.

Speaker 3 (09:39):
At Warwood, yeah, I mean we were small, obviously, a
small single a school. I think there was one hundred
and two in my graduating class. So you didn't have
to be really good. You just had to be better
than sixteen other kids.

Speaker 4 (09:53):
You know.

Speaker 3 (09:53):
It wasn't like I was this outstanding person I which
you could just throw better I guess than and we didn't.
I remember one year, our first three games we lost
twenty nine to nothing, sixty six to nothing in seventy
to six. So when you say I kicked for the team, yeah,

(10:14):
but I mean we scored a couple couple of touchdowns
a year. We were doing pretty good.

Speaker 1 (10:18):
Yeah, And within three years the school closes and it
consolidates in the Wheeling.

Speaker 3 (10:23):
Party Wheeling part. Yeah, seventy I graduated seventy four. I
think seventy six was the last year of Warwood High
and seventy seven I believe it was the first year
Wheeling Park.

Speaker 1 (10:34):
And think about this, So obviously your name will forever
be associated with that, Jack IDs you Wright Warwood. And
then Chuck Howley obviously as a graduate of Warwood High School,
he becomes an MVP in the Super Bowls of losing
team on a losing team right there. Yeah, I mean,
that's that's that's kind of like that defies the mathematical

(10:55):
odds to have two things like that.

Speaker 3 (10:56):
Ye never never met Chuck Howley. We had, Yeah, they
had a Chuck Holly Award they'd gave there for the
last couple of years of Warwood, which I was fortunate
enough to win my senior year. But Chuck never Chuck
never made it.

Speaker 1 (11:10):
Sure sure growing up in the Panhandle was back in
that day, like what steel mills were cooking? Right, I
mean it was it was going on there.

Speaker 3 (11:22):
Yeah, steel Wheeling, pet and Weirton Steel were Yeah, they
were the big thing. It was a couple of coal
mines around, but the steel mills. Yeah, that's where That's
where most of the folks.

Speaker 1 (11:32):
Were growing up. Was Like what for you was it
was college always going to be an option for you.
How did the whole association with wv you come about?

Speaker 3 (11:43):
Yeah, I mean college always Yeah, I guess I never
really thought about not going to college. That was just
one of those things. How WVU came around. Well, like
I said, I was a reasonable athlete. I guess football.
I had a couple offers from you know, small schools,

(12:04):
West Liberty High School. I wrestled in high school too,
was pretty good. I guess I had a couple offers
to wrestle. Must Gingham College, Bethany Road College, Yeah, right
up to well, West Liberty is right up street too,
And I just I don't know if I thought I
could do better or what. And well, I guess one

(12:25):
of the things that I think about it, I wanted
to go into engineering, and none of those schools had
a real engineering program. They had what you called pre engineering,
so you could go the first couple of years and
get your math and science and that stuff out of
the way, but you still had to transfer to go
somewhere else anyway, which didn't make a whole lot of
sense to me. So we just went to Morgantown.

Speaker 1 (12:46):
Came to Morgantown. And what were you led to believe
about participating on the football program.

Speaker 2 (12:54):
At that time?

Speaker 3 (12:54):
I well, obviously I was a walk on, but I
don't really I don't really remember going in there the
first day and or talking to anybody about how do
you walk on? I don't. I don't remember how that happened,
but I do, And I guess you want to hear
a story about how it all started. There was quite
a few of us, obviously, walk on. When your walk on,

(13:16):
they put a masking tape on your helmet with your
last name, and then when you go out on the field,
the coach, whatever coach you were assigned to, and clausing
was clausing was the coach. I was there. He had
defensive ends. I believe it was defensive tackles. Defensive ends.
So the coach would grab you by the face mask
and shake your head a little bit and say, Okay, Mackenzie,

(13:37):
you go over there, or you know, whatever your name was,
you go over there. So I held tackling dummies for
those guys for a couple of weeks. I guess never
even imagined that I would ever see the field. I
honestly don't know what I was doing hanging around. I
guess just something something to do after school, something to

(13:59):
do after school. Yeah, and then uh, one day Rocky
Ginola broke his leg. Are one of the equipment managers,
Mark Sobray, went to Warwood High School. I ran track
with Mark Sobray, and he came and saw me one
of those days in the locker room and said, Bill,
you know you they're looking for kickers. Rocky broke his

(14:19):
or their scholarship player broke his leg. They're looking for kickers.
I know you used to kick in high school. I
think they're having tryouts, you know, pick a day of
the week, Wednesday or something like that. So I said, well, okay.
So I went in and kind of got in line
with a bunch of other folks. Frank Nester was there.
I think he went out and we went out on
a field after practice and I don't know, half a

(14:42):
dozen of us or so, and they put a ball down,
you know, and you're trying to kick, and I guess
I did better than better than the rest of the
kids were there. Frank at the time, let me use
his square toed shoe. I had never even heard of
a square toad.

Speaker 1 (14:58):
So in high school you didn't wear the square No.

Speaker 3 (15:00):
I didn't even know what they were.

Speaker 4 (15:01):
And everybody was kicking straight on at this point. I
we have a soccer style.

Speaker 2 (15:05):
I don't.

Speaker 3 (15:05):
I don't really, I don't remember. But anyway, Frank let
me let me wear his square toed shoe. And obviously
that was a tremendous help.

Speaker 1 (15:14):
The heck of a deal.

Speaker 3 (15:15):
Yeah, that was a tremendous help.

Speaker 2 (15:16):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (15:17):
Yeah. And it's funny, like I said, if that was
a Wednesday. The very next day, say it was a Thursday.
You know, I'm trotting out there with the rest of
the guys with you know, the masking table in my head,
and it's like whoa hoa, Bill, whoa whoa. You're you
go over there? No more, no more tackling dummies for you.
You're over here with the kickers.

Speaker 1 (15:35):
The kickers.

Speaker 3 (15:37):
So that was my last tackling dummy holding day.

Speaker 1 (15:40):
So you did your apprenticeship holding the dummies, and then
you go over and you start to kick.

Speaker 3 (15:44):
Start to kick. Yes, and then uh again, obviously I
got to dress then had that not happened? There was
no way I was ever going to dress for a
football game. And then uh, the last ended up kicking
for the last two games of my friend year, you know,
believe it or not, made kicked five extra points, made
them all and then started being the kicker again that

(16:08):
they bought books for me.

Speaker 5 (16:10):
Uh.

Speaker 3 (16:11):
The next the second semester of my freshman year, okay,
and then it was on scholarship starting sophomore, junior, senior.

Speaker 1 (16:18):
So seventy five, you're on a scholarship. Yes. Yeah.

Speaker 4 (16:21):
Were you sitting there thinking, oh my gosh, look what
has happened? Or did you just day by day just
moved on to the next thing. Did you ever take
a moment and soak it in?

Speaker 5 (16:29):
Or no, I don't.

Speaker 3 (16:32):
I don't think so that doesn't. That doesn't ring a bell.
Yeah yeah, and again, well I knew i'd yeah, I
come up, come home less bruised.

Speaker 1 (16:41):
Yeah yeah, that was that was part of good part
of it.

Speaker 3 (16:44):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (16:44):
Yeah, you know, it's pretty wild when you think about
it in today's world. I mean, if a kid identifies
as potentially a pretty good player, like by the time
you were in ninth grade, you would have had a
kicking coach, you would have gone to seventh you would
have gone to seven kicking clinics, right, what happened?

Speaker 5 (17:01):
Ninth grade would have been behind? Yeah, yeah, that happened.
Grady's already behind.

Speaker 1 (17:06):
And it just so yeah, and it just sounds like
you just kind of wandered down said okay, what do
you want to do? Okay, that's fine.

Speaker 3 (17:12):
Well, again, this is fifty years ago.

Speaker 1 (17:13):
I get it. So like you step on the floor
field in seventy four. You're a true freshman, so you're
a year you're a year removed from playing at Warwood,
as you said, with about twenty dudes on your team,
and here you are, You're you're playing major college football.
Did that unnerve you at all? Just kind of like, yeah,

(17:34):
what were you hearing from back home back then, that
had to be a big deal that you got onto
the field.

Speaker 3 (17:38):
I honestly I don't remember.

Speaker 1 (17:42):
You mean were you mean you weren't getting self calls
at that time from from.

Speaker 3 (17:46):
Wed we didn't have cell phone. Might have got a
few notes or a couple of letters.

Speaker 1 (17:51):
Post guarded bill. I hear things are going well down there.
That that kind of a thing. So what was the
what was the program back then? What was the what
was the feel inside the program? You had mentioned clousing,
Uh you mentioned obviously Bobby Bowden. Is that what was
that like for you to kind of get into that
world and look around?

Speaker 3 (18:11):
Well again, I being kickers and nowadays, you know, I
don't know how much attention they get, But back then
you were I won't say an afterthought, but almost and afterthought.
I mean, you didn't really go to the offensive meetings.
You didn't go to the defensive meetings. They didn't have
a kicker meeting.

Speaker 1 (18:31):
That's a good point. You did not have a kicker coach.

Speaker 3 (18:34):
No or Chuck Clausing was the coach when I was
a freshman, was the coach, but he had defensive end.
I think he had linebackers and defensive ends. That was
called Now Donnie Young, I think had linebackers, the defensive tackle,
defensive ends. I think he was a defensive coordinator, so
he had other he had other stuff to do.

Speaker 1 (18:52):
And I've always found this wild Bill and I and
to a large extent, it's it's pretty much the same
that we talked so much about offensive players and defensive
players and when they get recruited and everything like, and
I still say to this day, specialists are not given

(19:13):
the respect that they deserve for the absolute reason of
what we just saw on that video, Like you can
do all of that stuff, but when the specialist comes
out and wins a game or loses a game. I've
always felt that there wasn't I think it's getting better.
But I know what you're saying, Like you were like
over in the corner and like don't speak until spoken to.

Speaker 3 (19:34):
Yeah, pretty much.

Speaker 2 (19:36):
With with no net to practice in.

Speaker 3 (19:38):
Oh no, well we didn't have a room in a
sidelines for net anyway.

Speaker 2 (19:41):
Well that's right, yeah, I remember. Sure. So you were
just over there.

Speaker 3 (19:44):
Try, you said, on the bleachers, and somebody'd tap you
on the helmet one of the yeah, one of the
fans that tap you on the helmet.

Speaker 2 (19:49):
You know that was a that was a good pit team. Yeah,
that I mean, And and I know I've read some
stories about I had forgotten my went back and read
some of the stories. But I mean, of course it
was a fourteen fourteen time. But as you often point
out when you're interviewed, that the defense did a good
job of forcing Pitt like two, a three and out right. Yeah. Now,

(20:11):
and they had Tony Dorset and Matt Kavanaugh. That was
a good team.

Speaker 3 (20:14):
Yeah. No, And again I know, I'll tell the story
till the day I die. If it wasn't for the defense,
I think Pitt had the ball first and ten with
less than a minute to go, Who in the world
would have ever believed we would even gotten the ball back,
let alone, have you know, ten or twelve seconds or
some time to do something.

Speaker 1 (20:33):
I looked at the scoring drive.

Speaker 3 (20:34):
Maybe that's the part that Jack Flumbing didn't believe.

Speaker 1 (20:37):
Well, because I looked at this, I think their possession
was less than sixty seconds. They might have had the
ball for forty or fifty seconds on last position in
West Virginia's last possession. According to the stat is, ten
seconds was the total.

Speaker 3 (20:50):
Time for one pass kend Or to Yeah, to Randy Twinson, Yeah,
one pass.

Speaker 2 (20:56):
Who was clearly in bounds.

Speaker 1 (20:57):
We all know that you think hoppy in nowadays that
might have been ruled out about well now the Statute
of Limitations passed.

Speaker 2 (21:05):
That that does bring you to my story that I'll
tell that I was at the game at the same age.
I was at school the same time as you were,
and I lived just up the street of McLean Avenue.
So we walked down the old stadium and it was
college days, had a terrible hangover. So we're sitting there,
me and my boys, about five of us sitting there,
and when Pitt got the ball back and they go
three and out and it's going to end in a tie.

(21:26):
Fourteen fourteen, and that game was on television. That game
was on TV, which at Jackson Keith Jackson, Jim lamp
was on the sideline, which was really d Virginia like
never happened. So I'm sitting there and I'm thinking, this
thing's going to end at a tie. Let's just go
home and let's walk up there the house and watch
the end.

Speaker 1 (21:45):
Why are we not surprised by this? Bread? I mean,
why are we not surprised?

Speaker 5 (21:48):
Ail from an event early.

Speaker 1 (21:50):
Yeah, imagine that you had you had somewhere to go nowhere,
So I was going to bail.

Speaker 2 (21:55):
I was gonna leave, and all the all my boys said, no,
we're staying. Well, you were saved. I was saved.

Speaker 5 (22:01):
You were saved.

Speaker 2 (22:01):
There, I was saved.

Speaker 5 (22:03):
I could rush the field. Huh did you rush the field?

Speaker 2 (22:05):
Oh yeah, everybody did.

Speaker 3 (22:06):
Were you on that pile?

Speaker 2 (22:07):
I was not on the pile, but I was on
the field. And then again it turned into an all
night thing. I mean, you probably had somewhere to go,
but it turned into an all night thing in Sunnyside.
It was the first. It was one of the first
sunny Side excessive party celebrations that we were part of.

Speaker 1 (22:25):
Going on.

Speaker 2 (22:25):
A lot of things were burning, but it was you know,
again in my history with mountaineer sports, that's that's my moment. Man.

Speaker 1 (22:34):
You've seen a lot, man, You've seen a lot of
big moments.

Speaker 2 (22:38):
Yeah, it was right there.

Speaker 5 (22:39):
Piles give me anxiety. You said you were on the bottom.

Speaker 2 (22:42):
Oh yeah, there a little bit, just hoping.

Speaker 3 (22:46):
I mean it's kind of like you have heard about
ball instricters. Yeah, you know, you lose a breath and
then you just keep losing that, Yeah, trying to keep
our lungs inflated. So we didn't.

Speaker 2 (22:58):
And you you have the ball? Correct?

Speaker 3 (23:00):
Pardon you have the ball?

Speaker 2 (23:02):
Yes, I do tell that story.

Speaker 1 (23:03):
Yeah, that's a good one to walk out of it
right and make sure they got it to you. Bernie Kirshner.

Speaker 2 (23:11):
And what was he doing in the stands, I have.

Speaker 3 (23:16):
No idea he was. I know he was on double
secret probation there at one time.

Speaker 2 (23:21):
Yes, the story, he was on double.

Speaker 3 (23:26):
And he was not exactly sure what he did, but
he was on.

Speaker 2 (23:29):
Yeah, so he was at times in the doghouse with
coach Bowden and he was he was in the bowl.

Speaker 5 (23:36):
And but that's a great job by him.

Speaker 2 (23:40):
Tell the story.

Speaker 3 (23:42):
Yeah, from what I understand, he didn't readily give the
ball up. He to off up sunnyside that the managers
had to chase him down and offer him a different one.

Speaker 1 (23:51):
Imagine that. Imagine that they were bummed out that they
lost a ball.

Speaker 4 (23:54):
They had a great moved by him though, to avoid
the rush sure and get the football and give it
to give it to Bill.

Speaker 2 (24:01):
Yep, still has it?

Speaker 3 (24:02):
Yep, I do still have it. How about that Bernie's Yeah,
I think he has a restaurant or a bar down
in Florida. Yeah, and I believe it or not, still
owing two hundred dollars from some long, long time ago.
I keep telling me about I'm coming down here one
of these days, but I haven't. I haven't made it yet.
Did you didn't forget you?

Speaker 1 (24:22):
Did you have any idea when you kick that ball
in the game's over that afternoon, the significance that it
would happen.

Speaker 3 (24:31):
I don't know that anybody could have could have thought
about that. No, not a not a chance.

Speaker 2 (24:36):
When did it dawn on you that that was I mean,
I was thinking coming in. Let me ask you this
that you've been asked about this over or under twenty
five hundred times easy over?

Speaker 1 (24:52):
Oh yeah, over over.

Speaker 2 (24:54):
Or under five thousand times over. Yeah.

Speaker 3 (24:57):
I don't know about that one. But I don't know.
It's it's a lot, it's it's a lot of time.

Speaker 2 (25:03):
It's your and you're obviously in excellent health. And I
don't want to bump me out, but it's the first
line of your obituary a w V athletics. You know
when don't when?

Speaker 1 (25:17):
I mean, I don't know why I got to put
the guy in the ground. I mean, I know why
you're sending a genda over there. I mean, where did
that come from?

Speaker 2 (25:25):
Understand what you're saying A defining It's.

Speaker 1 (25:28):
Always define him, it will always define him.

Speaker 2 (25:30):
Well, there's a lot of other things I'm sure as
a decent human being that defined him. But in terms
of WU sports, sure that's the definition. I'm not trying
to write your own by.

Speaker 3 (25:41):
I hadn't thought of it. I hadn't thought of that.

Speaker 1 (25:43):
Yeah, that's in there. That's in there.

Speaker 2 (25:45):
You know what.

Speaker 1 (25:45):
Also, we were talking earlier before we started recording about
how time you know, goes by and things like that.
The thing that hit me I was thinking about this
that game, that kick. That was only five years before
Neelan became the head coach. But for some reason, to me,
it seems like it was like generations earlier. Think about that,

(26:08):
Think about that. It seems like generation it was five
years now. Let me tell you this. When I get
scared you want to feel old, I'll make you feel old.

Speaker 4 (26:15):
Well, you guys are real joy.

Speaker 2 (26:17):
Yeah, when can I.

Speaker 5 (26:20):
Come back station back?

Speaker 1 (26:23):
Think about this?

Speaker 5 (26:24):
Our guest list.

Speaker 1 (26:26):
So we're here today and it's twenty twenty five and
we're talking about a game in nineteen seventy five, which
makes it fifty years ago. If you were if you
if you in nineteen seventy five, if you were sitting
around with your boys talking about a game that was
fifty years earlier at West Virginia, it would be the
nineteen twenty five game. Now, if that doesn't make you go, WHOA,

(26:48):
what is up with that? And we sat around here
talking like it happened last week?

Speaker 3 (26:53):
Yeah?

Speaker 2 (26:53):
Yeah, And I do think you know, based on that
Bill that I said, I've told a bunch of people
I said, I'm excited we're gonna talk to Bill McKenzie.
There is a younger generation even of Mountain Your fans
that that don't know Okay, I mean people who know
the program intimately know it, Brian Brad. But there is
a generation like if somebody when I was in schoolhen
somebody started telling me about rat Rodgers, like I wouldn't

(27:15):
have any idea, Like Mickey for Ferry's telling stories about
rat Rodgers.

Speaker 1 (27:17):
Yeah, exactly. You remember Mickey. Mickey used to tell us
like these stories and like we would look at him
like sideways, going like Mickey, like I don't, I don't
The sun Bowl nineteen. What I we don't, I mean no,
And we would look at him like it was two
hundred years ago, like Ben Franklin was in the stance,
and now we're sitting there and we're talking about fifty
years ago like it was last week.

Speaker 3 (27:37):
Bill.

Speaker 4 (27:37):
You said he had no idea what that moment would become.
How about Bobby Bowden any idea, any inkling that he
would go on to become who he was in the
world of college football?

Speaker 2 (27:46):
Question?

Speaker 3 (27:49):
I don't know how to I don't know how to
answer that one. No, but he, uh, he was a
great guy. But again, never I never really had that
much to do with it. Again, being a kicker, I
mean even the kicking coach. You only saw two periods,
two periods at the end of practice.

Speaker 2 (28:07):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (28:07):
So the story, I don't doubt any of the stories
about how nice a guy. I mean, every time I
ever met him, talked to him, he was just the
nice as could be. He sent me a letter I
wrote him, I had a picture of the pit game
and ask if he would sign it I sent into
his company or whatever. He wrote me this really nice
long letter about how you doing. He knew where I

(28:29):
grew up. He knew my mom and dad. Sure, really,
I mean it was unbelievable.

Speaker 4 (28:33):
That had to feel a little SURREALO as you were
watching him go through Florida State and win national, be
in the mix for national. Was it just odd to
see him there knowing he was your coach, knowing you
did have some interaction or do you not really ever
think about it?

Speaker 3 (28:47):
No, not anything I can think. You know, every time
he was up for national champions it's like I know
that guy, right, I mean I got a letter from
him right here. I mean I know that guy.

Speaker 1 (28:57):
I once made an afternoon for Yeah, I once made.

Speaker 5 (29:00):
Us happen to that pretty good day for coach Balden.

Speaker 1 (29:03):
But I could, I can all you can almost in
my picture. And I know how they like kickers. Like
we said earlier, kickers were just they're different. They're like
they're like they're just around. Need when you need him,
you come back.

Speaker 2 (29:15):
Boy.

Speaker 1 (29:15):
I want to tell you something you that was a
good job and give you a tap on the head
and see you later. That was it. That was the
extent of it. Yeah, good job. We appreciate it.

Speaker 3 (29:23):
By yeah, well, I mean even see that too. You
know they're even today when the coaches are around, you know,
they're talking to the players that they're arguing about this
or all that or whatever. They score touch down, he
turns around and puts one finger up. That's the only interaction.
I mean, that's it.

Speaker 1 (29:40):
No, I'm with you, man, I'm with you, three guys
before the game is brought to us by the good
friends at Gomart. I mentioned this all the time. You
got to get that Gomart app. Just put it on
your phone. Brad has it. I have it. Hit the
road with Gomart because you immediately begin saving on food
and fuel. And you know I clicked on here recently

(30:01):
and now they got twenty cents off a gallon of gas.
All you gotta do is for free, play a video
game on the app and you get twenty bill That's
a hell of a deal. I gotta do is play
a video game on a phone. You have twenty off
a gallon. I mean have ten gallons. I mean you're
an engineer. Ten gallons. That's two bucks. Twenty gallons.

Speaker 5 (30:17):
That'd before the super easy to is was just there
the other day getting.

Speaker 1 (30:20):
Guessed, were you nice to the people this time?

Speaker 5 (30:22):
And then go inside just got guess he has a problem.

Speaker 1 (30:24):
He just goes in there and starts yelling at Tony.

Speaker 4 (30:28):
Why do you say that, well, characterization, I did walk
in and I asked for help.

Speaker 5 (30:34):
That's what you're supposed to do. Where they help, they're
very nice.

Speaker 4 (30:37):
Yeah, that's it's postal plaza there, that's right. Yeah, posts
are perfectly Okay, that's what you do. They got a
food for help.

Speaker 1 (30:43):
They got a restaurant attached to them over there, don't they,
Brad Yeah, Burger king on that one. Yeah, on the
left side there, I think with the b K.

Speaker 2 (30:49):
Also.

Speaker 1 (30:50):
Three guys brought to us by Comac's Business Systems. When
it comes to comas.

Speaker 2 (30:55):
Characterized, I don't know why he does that.

Speaker 1 (30:57):
Well, I didn't mean it in a negative way. You
just walk in there and go where's the snickers? Where's
the racing?

Speaker 2 (31:01):
Where's the.

Speaker 1 (31:04):
Right the donuts? Do you like those?

Speaker 3 (31:07):
I'm guessing donut.

Speaker 1 (31:10):
Exactly, thank you very much, like a like a deer
dough don't.

Speaker 5 (31:14):
Name you knew exactly what they were.

Speaker 1 (31:15):
Three guys brought to us by Comac's Business Systems. The
refreshing offices across the state of West Virginia and beyond.
Stop hauling around those big bottles of water, plastic bottlegs.
You don't need it. Put a water system in cold water,
hot water ice. They got it for you. Visit COMAXWUV
dot com. That's COMAXWV dot com. So you come to
school here and you get into the engineering program again

(31:39):
small school, high school wise academically, did you get right
in it? Just for pretty good? How'd that go? Uh?

Speaker 3 (31:47):
Chemistry gave me problems? But uh no, I high school.
I really didn't do all that much studying. I mean,
I won't say it came naturally, but it wasn't something
that I really need to kill myself studying. You're pretty
smart when you get well, when you get to colleague.

(32:08):
That's a little different atmosphere or a lot different atmosphere,
I guess. So yeah, I did, Okay, I graduated. Why
engineering just something I've always wanted to be. I have
no idea, I don't know any It's not like my
family was engineers. I don't know. Just something I just

(32:29):
always wanted to be.

Speaker 2 (32:30):
Did you have When I came up here, I was
overwhelmed because I came from a small town like you.
I was overwhelmed by the size and the number of
people took me a while. Did you struggle with that
at all?

Speaker 3 (32:40):
Yeah? I mean how many people in class and yeah,
they didn't care if you had a question or not
because there was so many people in there. And then
have them to uh, you know, I'm used to the
high school was again for a hundred kids in your class.
You didn't need very big You walked across a hall.
Maybe for another class here you got to get on
a bus or the PRT or.

Speaker 1 (32:59):
Back then that's that PRT was new.

Speaker 3 (33:01):
Yeah, right, I already worked. That was That was the
best excuse. All you had to do is say the
pr T was down.

Speaker 1 (33:07):
First.

Speaker 3 (33:08):
They didn't care. They kept the lessons going.

Speaker 2 (33:09):
So did you ever?

Speaker 1 (33:10):
Did you ever?

Speaker 2 (33:11):
Did you have any point where you thought like this
isn't for me, I'm going home? I did? I mean
I stuck it out.

Speaker 3 (33:16):
But did you I probably had several of that. Might
none come to mind?

Speaker 2 (33:20):
Yeah?

Speaker 1 (33:22):
Probably if you didn't become a kicker, would you have
held the bags and practice for a long time? You
would have walked.

Speaker 3 (33:28):
I probably would have walked. I guess again, I mean
it was used to being in the mix of that.

Speaker 1 (33:34):
Again, you were with small Yeallo, captain of the wrestling team, used.

Speaker 3 (33:39):
To being in the mix with things, and I don't
know how much longer I would have held tackling dummies.

Speaker 2 (33:45):
So how many things, how many points had to be
connected for all this to happen. You know, we're talking
about one of the seminal moments in sports history, and
how many and hearing Bill's stories, how many of these
things brand had to had to happen for it to.

Speaker 4 (33:59):
Happen, or how easily it could have not happened. It
probably shouldn't have happened. Quite frankly, it's a better way
to say that, of all the things that had to
happen to make it come to fruition, it probably should
have never happened.

Speaker 2 (34:08):
Right.

Speaker 1 (34:09):
I think I can go on record and say, this
greatest thing that ever happened to you in your life
is Rocky Genola broke his leg.

Speaker 3 (34:19):
Yeah, thank you, Rocky, Thanks Rocky.

Speaker 1 (34:23):
But think about that. If Rocky gen Ol doesn't break
his legs.

Speaker 5 (34:27):
To start there, that's one about on the list.

Speaker 3 (34:29):
Although they did it, and again, sorry rock they did
put Rocky in to kick before it was my turn
after Emil Ross. They put Rocky in, Okay, and I
don't exactly remember, but obviously that didn't go very well.
So I was the third option at kicking that year.

Speaker 1 (34:51):
Also this, I looked into this today. You won a
game technically before you won the pit game Virginia Tech.
You hit a field goal and gave West Virginia a
three point lead and you won the game.

Speaker 3 (35:04):
Yeah, And I, well, I have the I have the
ball for the game ball for that one too, And
that one just doesn't feels well. That one just doesn't
feel the same, you know. I think it was I know,
but I think it was in a third quarter or
something that.

Speaker 1 (35:16):
Happened to win three, ten to seven over Virginia ten.

Speaker 3 (35:20):
To walk off You No, it was not. No. I mean,
it's glad I got it, glad we did it, but
it's not well like a hit game or a well
a Richmond actually want to be rich one.

Speaker 2 (35:31):
Yeah too, an he win back in the day over VP.

Speaker 1 (35:33):
I yeah, and ninth grade, ninth grade freshman basketball, I
scored a bucket in the second quarter and we won
forty seven forty six. So I always say I had
the game winning, but without my two, they're not winning.
I'd take it.

Speaker 3 (35:48):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (35:49):
Yeah, but that did that did kind of make me
go like Oh wow, I didn't realize you had hit one.
So help me here. Someone told me that you guys
either weren't a tempting a lot of field goals that year,
but like West Virginia was one of the last teams
in the country that season to make a field goal
in a game.

Speaker 3 (36:06):
Yes, that is correct. We were good. We were good. Yes,
I mean I think we won. You won nine games,
most of our games, yeah, without even having to kick
a field goal.

Speaker 1 (36:16):
Yeah, and you guys went I'm beating at North Carolina State. Yes,
that season, so Peach Bowl ended and ended with the victy.

Speaker 3 (36:23):
Yeah, and again that's thirteen ten. That sounds like I
made a field goal. I did not.

Speaker 1 (36:28):
You missed an extra point.

Speaker 3 (36:29):
I missed my first extra leal. Yes, so that's why
it's thirteen to ten. I did not make a field goal.

Speaker 1 (36:35):
Just go with it. But listen, when you get back
to the golf club, just go like, yeah, there's another
one I won. I just it was last person ten ten.
I went in there as a half a second or
something left. I just banged one. This one again.

Speaker 3 (36:46):
I don't know, I don't know what happened there.

Speaker 1 (36:47):
Yeah, jeez, did so you're you're relatively young, you're a
sophomore when you kick the pit, when you make the
kick against pipes, And I said, do you have any
idea that night? How signific't that was? You go? Nah,
probably not. But like junior year, senior year had the
mythical Bill McKenzie legend did did it last? Did it

(37:10):
or did you feel it then? Or was it years?
It just grew over years.

Speaker 3 (37:14):
I think it grew over years. I mean obviously escalated
pretty quickly that next year, but no, I kind of
just grew over the years.

Speaker 1 (37:23):
Yeah, I think Jack Fleming's voice on it, and then
YouTube and the fact that the highlights out there because
there's so many plays that aren't out there for you know,
from that era, but that one being captured, as you said,
it was on Big Boy Television. Frank Broyles and Keith
Jackson did the game, and as you said, Jim Lampley

(37:45):
was the sideline report. Now that's a crew and it
was it was it was, it was it was a
regional game. It was, yeah, it was, but it was
the a crew that did the game. And so like
I think, like for generations, if that doesn't exist, just
that clip, it probably just kind of goes away, but

(38:06):
that will always have a living.

Speaker 3 (38:08):
On So oh yeah, no like hops out. I mean
there's so many stars had to all. Yeah, I had
a lot same thing. If that wasn't on TV, this
wouldn't be near the big deal either.

Speaker 2 (38:18):
But Bill, you did have a life after the field goal,
So you became an engineer. Tell us what you did
after that after you graduated, well.

Speaker 3 (38:27):
Right after graduation, started work at Weird and Steel as
a start as a management trainee. Ended up being a
mechanical supervisor in what was the Blooming Mill back then.
Doesn't exist anymore, was there for I started there in
seventy eight, So in eighty six I left there and went.

Speaker 2 (38:51):
To New Course Steel, Yeah.

Speaker 3 (38:53):
Down in as a project engineer. New Course Steel down
in Darlington, South Carolina.

Speaker 2 (39:00):
Me.

Speaker 3 (39:00):
We were working on a new project called thin slab casting,
which at the time no one had ever even heard of.
A lot of folks had tried, or a lot of
companies had tried it, us Steel, Bethlee. I mean a
lot of those folks tried it. They just could never
get it working. Well, we got we got it working.

Speaker 1 (39:19):
Okay, Okay, explain to me like I'm a fifth grader.
What thin slab.

Speaker 3 (39:22):
Well again and steel and steel making. When they cast slabs,
you know, they take the molten metal, they cast them
into slabs what they call slabs, and these are anywhere
between eight nine ten inches thick steel full steel, and
then they roll them. They run them through the roller
mill and just make them from you know, eight inches
to six to four to two to one to as

(39:43):
thin as.

Speaker 1 (39:43):
Your car is hold roll strip steel.

Speaker 3 (39:45):
No, this is hot, this is hot, well hot rolled
from making it from eight down to next to nothing.
Then they cold roll it afterwards. But that would take
I mean millions and millions of dollars. I can't think
of how many stands, you know, rolling stands you had
to go through to get from twelve inches or ten
inches down to a quarter inch so they could run

(40:06):
it over to the coal mill. Well, we at New
Core and everybody was trying to do this what they
called thin slab casting. We actually cast the slab at
two inches thick.

Speaker 1 (40:15):
Took away a lot of time.

Speaker 3 (40:17):
So it took away so much time, so much energy,
so much equipment. You know, now it only takes one
set of stands. I think we had four mill stands
to take it from two inches to a quarter inch
instead of hundreds of millions of dollars that most of
the steel companies had at the time. So we started
the first one of those out in Crawfordsville, Indiana. So

(40:39):
I moved to Indiana in that would have been eighty
eight or January of eighty eight. We got that one
working for News Corps. And then they after that one
was successful, they built another one down in Arkansas. So
I moved to Arkansas with the second one. And now
thin slab casters are kind of all over the place,
but back in eighty eight, that was the first.

Speaker 1 (41:01):
So you guys revolutionized the industry.

Speaker 3 (41:03):
Yes, that was the first one ever anywhere.

Speaker 2 (41:07):
So you spent your life in the steel industry and
then retired.

Speaker 3 (41:09):
My life in still Wegan went from Newcore in Arkansas.
Then we took a short hiatus, came back to Parkersburt
Well Ravenswood, West Virginia in aluminum business. And we thought
it was myself, Well, my boss was Rodney Mott and

(41:29):
he still is in South Carolina. I'll get to that
story in a minute. We moved up here thought we
could try the new Core method, which was push all
of the the what am I trying to say? Responsibility
down to the people running a machine. I mean, who
knows better how to run a machine than the guy
running a machine. You don't have bosses and all these

(41:51):
you know, layers of management and stuff trying to do that. Well,
we lasted about a year and a half in Ravenswood
and that just they didn't care for that. They just
they just did the Ravenswood Union and passionate the French company.
They just we that was like oil and water.

Speaker 1 (42:07):
So we the home of the red running red Devils,
ran out.

Speaker 3 (42:10):
Yeah, we we lasted about a year and a half
and they well actually let me go. Well, let both
of us go. I guess which was the best thing
that ever happened, if you don't mind me continuing. Uh,
this was it was like January thirty first. I remember
like it was yesterday and January thirty first in West Virginia.

(42:32):
I went home, I got a beer and I'm standing
out on the back porch. My wife says, you know
what's wrong, Well, January thirty first is not the time
of West Virginia. You said on your back ports and
drink beer. Sod, what's wrong? I said, Well, I said,
I just got let go from Ravenswood. I just I
just got let go. I don't know what I'm going
to do. I have no clue. So on February forth,

(42:55):
this is two weeks two weeks later after I'm stumbling
around figured out what what the hell am I going
to do now? Thinking about writing resumes and all this stuff.
Rodney Mott, who I just mentioned, Ka, you lived right
next door, well, Katy Wampus from us and he says, hey,
I want to meet you down here at the country club.
He says, I got something you might be interested. So

(43:16):
he goes down there, we meet. He says, there's this
guy named Wilbur Ross who is working on buying a
steel mill LTV LTV in Cleveland. It was shut down.
He said, he's working on trying to get some folks together.
He says, I don't know if this is going to
work or not, but would you be interested in coming
up and you know, seeing what you can do. I

(43:37):
might send you to Chicago. I might send you to
Philadelphia to look at the equipment. He says, I don't know.
Just keep your receipts. This may or may not work
well for expenses. He says, keep your receipts. This mayor
may not work. And this was that was February, so
I think it was probably April that again, I kept receipts.

(43:59):
I might add four five hundred dollars worth of receipts or.

Speaker 1 (44:03):
Something like that.

Speaker 3 (44:03):
I get a check from Wilbur Ross for ten thousand dollars.
You think this will cover it? This is good, this
is going to work. So we all went to Cleveland
at the time, got LTV started up, then started buying
other steel mills, right. We bought We went from Clevelan.
I don't know the exact order here. We bought Cleveland,

(44:25):
we bought our LTV, We bought Bethlehem, Inland, Acme, Georgetown, Weirton,
we at the ISG. We named it International Steel Group
at the time was the biggest steel mill in the country,
bigger than we were, bigger than us steel Wow. And
with me, I guess I was the down home kind

(44:46):
of guy. I guess I was the one on the
ground that they would send in first to do the
you know, the union negotiations. And I was the regular
guy from down the street, so I could talk to
the unions. And so I started it Warren, Ohio, and
a coke plant was there about nine months when we
bought Bethlehem, I went to Coatesville. The plate Lukens what

(45:08):
was the old Luken's mill in Philadelphia was there for
about a year and a half and we bought Weirton Steel,
so they took me from there, sent me to Weirton
Steel for about a year and a half. We sold
ISG to Middle This was in O five somewhere.

Speaker 1 (45:26):
In five so the public transaction. Yes, what was the
number on that?

Speaker 3 (45:33):
Four billion? I think yeah, not a bad day. I
think it was for four billion. Anyway, I thought I
wasn't ready to I was forty eight years old. I
wasn't ready to retire. Rod and a couple of the
other folks left. I said, now I'm gonna it's weird
And Steel. I've been to Weirden Steel before. I'm gonna
hang on here for a little bit. I lasted about
two months, Sin said, I kid, they don't like the

(45:55):
way I've operate. I don't like the where they're operating.
So I retired. Wow, September I was that would have
been five I guess, yeah. And let me for those
of you that are thinking about retiring. It's the easiest
job in a little he just did. I mean, you
just don't go to work next day. It's the easiest

(46:16):
thing in the world. But don't do it without a plan.

Speaker 2 (46:20):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (46:21):
I just up and didn't go to work the next day.
Without a plan. I had no idea what to do.
Oh drove my wife crazy. She actually, and I don't
know if this is true, she says she called Rodney
Mott after a couple months and said, rod find this
guy something to do.

Speaker 1 (46:37):
He was driving me crazy.

Speaker 3 (46:39):
Yeah, So in February of six, Stelko called Rodney and said, hey,
we saw what you did with ISG, with all those
other mills. We'd like to come up to Stelco and
do the same thing. So I was retired for about
six months, maybe eight months, went back to work again
in Hamilton area up with Stelco. We kind of did

(47:02):
the same thing. We were there about a year and
a half, kind of got it turned around a little bit,
sold it to US Steel. And that's what I said.
My last working day was Halloween of seven.

Speaker 2 (47:15):
He's a he's a steel industry turnaround specialist.

Speaker 1 (47:18):
Yeah, well that's what he is. So how many moves
so do have you ever counted how many moves that
sounded like a bunch of moves that was like a
that's like six to nine moves.

Speaker 3 (47:26):
Well, yeah, and my wife never did. My wife and
kids did not go the last couple times, right, But
I guess, I guess I went from Wheeling, or from
West Virginia to South Carolina to Indiana to Arkansas. That's
four to West Virginia to Ohio to Pennsylvania, back to
West Virginia, then to Canada and then well now we're

(47:49):
in Arizona.

Speaker 1 (47:50):
And it surprised me. We talked or texted recently. You've
got two kids that live here in West Virginia. I do.

Speaker 3 (47:56):
My daughter, Lauren actually works for the university some kind
of a she's a vet tack and apologize Lauren, but
something to do with the animal research. And my son
John is a police officer in Wheeling. Well, actually he's
a cane what it called canine handler. Oh yeah, he
has one of the dogs in uh in Wheeling.

Speaker 2 (48:15):
Yeah, you still have folks in back back in the
Wheeling area.

Speaker 3 (48:20):
Well, my brother, my brother still lives there, has a
couple of cousins that lived there. Mom and dad passed
several several years ago.

Speaker 2 (48:28):
Yeah, what did your dad do? Did you work in
the steel mill?

Speaker 1 (48:30):
No?

Speaker 3 (48:31):
He was, Ah, he sold trucks. He was a general
manager of Wheeling White Truck.

Speaker 2 (48:37):
Would you you live? Where'd you live in Worlwood, clear.

Speaker 3 (48:39):
View, up on the hill, up close to close to
Ogibi Park?

Speaker 1 (48:43):
Yeah, sure, sure, sure, absolutely So that's a good story.
So I never knew the background. I knew you were
an engineering but I didn't know how many pops. Yeah,
you had to get to.

Speaker 3 (48:54):
Ye, quite a few, you say. My wife and kids,
they couldn't. We didn't realize it was going to go
that fast. I mean, you buy a new steel company
every year. We didn't realize what was going to go
that fast. But thankfully she did not try to move
or yeah, she'd have been worn out.

Speaker 1 (49:09):
Well help him because he retired. I don't know how
long has it been now he's semi retired. He got
any words of wisdom for him?

Speaker 3 (49:16):
Again, have a plant and don't retire in the winter
in West Virginia.

Speaker 2 (49:21):
That's exactly what I did.

Speaker 3 (49:26):
Much to do.

Speaker 2 (49:27):
I'm adjusted. So Tony, let's go the rifle route.

Speaker 1 (49:31):
I was gonna That's where I was gonna go. You're
wearing the mountaineer rifle hat, the national champion Mountaineer riflers.
You know what, I met the young lady who was
West Virginia's last shooter to win the national championship. And
basically I don't know if enough people know the story yet,
but in essence it was, I mean it was similar

(49:52):
to what you did. It was a walk off win.
And she had three shots and she didn't re realize
what she had to do. But had she shot two
nines instead of am I rel she went nine ten ten.
If she would have gone nine to nine ten, West
Virginia doesn't win the world championship and she goes nine

(50:15):
ten ten on her last ever shot as a shooter
because she's not going to go under the Olympics. And
so that was a walk off national championship.

Speaker 3 (50:25):
Well, that was unbelievable. Again, we were there. That was
down in Lexington. There's another comeback story for you. I
mean they were third after the in rifle. They have
small I'm not telling you guys something. You know, they
have a small board what they call small boar, which
is twenty two twenty twos, and then they have air rifle,
which is essentially pellet guns. So they shoot both the

(50:47):
morning and an afternoon session for each So after the
first more or after the first session the small board,
they were in third place by I don't remember exactly
how many points, ten or twelve or something like that,
but ten points in a rifle match is a lot.
It's a lot. And then after the first round of
air rifle, there in second place. And this girl, God,

(51:10):
I apologize, I can't don't think of her name off
the top of my head. Natalie Natalie, Yeah, but she
is that not only was she was her last shot,
she was the last part. You shoot at your own pace.
They have twenty five or thirty of them up there,
and some of them shoot in you remember Etzel, I
don't know if you were riding.

Speaker 1 (51:29):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, he'd.

Speaker 3 (51:30):
Shoot five hundred shots in ten minutes. Some of them
take it down to the very last one. Well, she
not only was her last shot, she was the last
person standing in the line. So this is the last day,
the last afternoon, the last thing. She's the last person
at the line. She needs to hit a ten oh
when and she hit a ten point one.

Speaker 1 (51:53):
Natalie Perne.

Speaker 2 (51:54):
Yeah, the unbelievable Verry mckinzisque finish on that unbelievable?

Speaker 1 (51:59):
What got you into you're a huge supporter.

Speaker 3 (52:03):
The earliest I can remember is uh, Ben Murray, who
now had a Mountain Athletic Club. He came, this has
been well quite a few years ago, I guess, and said,
Uh that the rifle team had just won a championship
and I don't know how many years ago that was,
and they were looking for someone to help finance or
help buy rings for them, and they said it was

(52:26):
going to be something like six thousand dollars or seven
thousand or something like that. Would you be interested? And
I said, Ben, I said, not only am I interested?
You don't need to look for anybody else.

Speaker 1 (52:36):
We'll just we'll do it.

Speaker 3 (52:37):
Consider us. Yeah, we're we're the ring people. We'll do it.
We're the ring people. Yeah, we'll do it. So little
did I know they were going to win three in
a row. We have And again I don't know how
many years ago, but so far or I mean since then,
we've been the ring people. So we bought every time
they went an NC championship, we by the rings for him.

Speaker 1 (53:00):
Yeah, do you hunt? Do you shoot?

Speaker 3 (53:04):
What's your I shoot? Again? You used to do hunting.
Nobody in West Virginia. I mean, everybody in West Virginia
has to hunt them some type, right. But I shoot.
Now it's pistol shooting. We have belonging a Scottsdale gun
club out there and they've got an indoor range. So
I shoot. I try to go every Monday. I don't
make it every Monday, but it's it's pistol shooting.

Speaker 2 (53:24):
You know, Tony is an excellent hunter.

Speaker 1 (53:26):
Bill. Can I tell you my hunting story? So these
guys on this show attacked me really unfair. I said,
if I shoot something I wanted, I want an animal
that could hurt me. I wanted to run at me, right.

Speaker 2 (53:41):
So I said, first fail.

Speaker 1 (53:42):
So I said, like a deer is never going to
take a run atge. I need something bigger. I said,
how about like a bore? Right. So these guys laugh
at me and they say a boor would go right
after your leg they kill you. Uh, I say, okay, fine.
They said we've never shot before, You've never like, what
would you do? And I said, well, they got those
scope they put on those guns. I said, I just
lined that thing up, put it right there right, put

(54:06):
in the crosshairs. Let her go. See these guys laughing.
So this guy's listening. He says, come on down here,
we'll go go down to southern West Virginia. Go out there. Start.
Guy gives me a lesson, says, okay, here it is
shot twice at a target. First one might have been

(54:27):
a little loft, second one. He goes, boom, you got it. Okay, fine,
We go out there, hunt this board down. Ferocious, ferocious beast.
We start following it and I walk in and I
see it, and I said again. They said, okay, man,
this is it. I lined that thing up and absolutely

(54:48):
torched it, blew it up fast.

Speaker 4 (54:51):
Do you think it was running at you when you
knocked it down? Just get It's hard, I know, it's
hard to tell.

Speaker 5 (54:56):
You're looking through a scope.

Speaker 4 (54:58):
It's coming fast miles for hour.

Speaker 5 (55:02):
How fast you think it was running?

Speaker 1 (55:04):
It wasn't running at me.

Speaker 6 (55:05):
It wasn't.

Speaker 1 (55:06):
It was not running correct.

Speaker 4 (55:07):
So it couldn't have It couldn't have done you any
harm like you originally had seen.

Speaker 1 (55:10):
Had he seen me, and I think Bill would probably
know had he seen me, he's coming at it wasn't.
It was not at that moment.

Speaker 5 (55:16):
Have we confirmed was the boar alive when you shot it?

Speaker 1 (55:20):
Talk about that for sure? Oh yeah, I'll show you
the picture.

Speaker 5 (55:24):
Before might have already been dead. It was very much
sleeping at nothing else.

Speaker 2 (55:30):
Well, there's some theory that he missed the shot, but
the hog.

Speaker 4 (55:34):
Died of a heart attack, or that someone else in
the group maybe it actually fired exactly like, Look.

Speaker 5 (55:40):
Tony's a great shot.

Speaker 1 (55:41):
I look got the boar coming up. Coming up.

Speaker 5 (55:47):
We've been talking with storytime pretty quickly.

Speaker 1 (55:48):
We know I've got seriously, I got the guy was video.
The guy was documented. I got it on video. I'll
show you the picture. You're going to be impressed when
you see the hole that I put on side of.

Speaker 2 (55:56):
The Oh gosh, Now you're just I'm just saying that
that's true.

Speaker 3 (56:00):
Came at you sideways.

Speaker 1 (56:01):
Well, yeah, he was.

Speaker 3 (56:03):
Very good sponsor.

Speaker 5 (56:06):
Go ahead, Bill got you on that one. Yeah, walk off, Bill.

Speaker 1 (56:17):
I could just tell when I had him lined up
he was pissed. Hey, don't forget. Coming up, we've been
talking about the motocross event over at high Point. This
thing is one of the great stops in motocross year
in and year out, and once again it's annual run
is coming up at the high Point Event. It's in

(56:38):
Mount Morris, Pennsylvania. We're going to be there on June thirteen,
which is the Friday Rev Kev's barbecue as well. Hoppy
is going to be riding a bike kind of just
like that's hot that hobby. I'd be Hoppy in practice
there too. Tickets are on sale now and all you

(57:00):
gotta do is go to the website, uh for the
high Point National Event and that is coming up on
Father's Day weekend. So that's so. So are you a
good pistol shooter?

Speaker 3 (57:11):
I think so?

Speaker 1 (57:12):
Oh, so you are good because you're humble as hell
that you must be really good.

Speaker 4 (57:18):
So you shoot on Monday's golf every other day of
the week.

Speaker 3 (57:22):
Yes, Tuesday, Wednesday, we golf Tuesday Wednesday, Thursday, Saturday occasionally,
Sunday nice occasionally.

Speaker 1 (57:30):
How many hold runs hold ones in your career?

Speaker 3 (57:32):
Four? Wow?

Speaker 2 (57:35):
Wait, there he goes good?

Speaker 3 (57:36):
But only one of them was a really good shot?

Speaker 2 (57:41):
What does that mean?

Speaker 1 (57:43):
What does that mean?

Speaker 3 (57:43):
Well, I mean, I don't know. I've witnessed quite a
few of them, I believe it or not. And some
of them are you know those nice that you see
on TV, those nice high ones that kind of skip
a couple of times. Some of them roll across the
ground and bounce off a tree and end up in
the hole. I one of mine was, yeah, one of

(58:04):
those that, yeah, kind of rolled around and had no
business even being on.

Speaker 5 (58:08):
Just go with whatevery times on the scorecard.

Speaker 1 (58:11):
How many? How many times have you had a shot
that you got screwed off of? Just take those back, yep.
Best part of your game.

Speaker 3 (58:19):
Driver putter, chipping putt.

Speaker 1 (58:21):
You're a chipping putter.

Speaker 3 (58:22):
I don't. I don't hit very many greens, so I
have to be able to Yeah I can, I can chip.

Speaker 1 (58:28):
And how you deal with the heat?

Speaker 3 (58:31):
Gets hot but there's no humidity? Well you do here?

Speaker 1 (58:34):
We go, dry heat guy, Dry heat guy.

Speaker 3 (58:36):
You do t off early?

Speaker 1 (58:38):
Well? How so what are you normally getting out at seven?

Speaker 3 (58:40):
Seven thirty?

Speaker 1 (58:41):
Okay?

Speaker 3 (58:42):
Done by ten ish?

Speaker 1 (58:44):
Yeah?

Speaker 2 (58:44):
See you like it out there? Right? You like it
out there?

Speaker 1 (58:46):
Yeah?

Speaker 3 (58:47):
Yeah, I love it.

Speaker 2 (58:48):
You're in scott You're in scottste.

Speaker 3 (58:49):
That kind of north Scottsdale.

Speaker 2 (58:50):
Here, it's nice, nice here.

Speaker 3 (58:52):
Where you know that when you read the temperatures, you
know what, one twenties hot? I got it. There's no
there's no yes, there's no kids. One twenty right there hot.
One town's not bad, but one twenty is hot.

Speaker 2 (59:07):
You know.

Speaker 3 (59:07):
But when you see the Phoenix temperature, I mean they're
talking about four o'clock downtown Phoenix, right, I mean that's
as hot as it gets. We're up, we're probably two
thousand feet higher than Phoenix, right, So if it's we're
ten or twelve degrees cooler where we are, then what
you will read, you know, what you'll read is a
Phoenix temperature bill.

Speaker 2 (59:29):
You know what other legendary mountaineers out there in the
Greater Phoenix metroplex is Kevin White? Former quarterback Kevin White.

Speaker 3 (59:35):
I think I've met him out there one long time.

Speaker 2 (59:37):
Judge, Kevin White.

Speaker 1 (59:38):
Is your wife still trying to get you out of
the house or is she kind of settled in now?
She calling anybody to try to get you work now done?

Speaker 3 (59:44):
And she she golfs three or four times, and okay,
well fortunately we're we belong to two different golf courses. Okay,
so I got we when we left the one golf course,
Scottsdale National. I don't you probably heard of that bob
part and spought that thing. Anyway, we left and the
guys that I used to golf with went to Desert
Mountain that the women that she golf with went to

(01:00:08):
True North. So she does her three or four days
a week. I do my three or four days a week.
We never see each other.

Speaker 1 (01:00:16):
No, no, there's there's that's good. You see her and
you see her in the house. But I mean if
you were with her on the course, might get a
little bit much.

Speaker 3 (01:00:24):
Right, We're good.

Speaker 2 (01:00:25):
But one of the friends of the program you're probably
familiar with is Steve Dunlap who was on that He
was on that team.

Speaker 3 (01:00:32):
Yes, yes, intercepted one believe in that game?

Speaker 2 (01:00:36):
Did did he win?

Speaker 1 (01:00:37):
Three? Three yard return? Three yard return?

Speaker 3 (01:00:41):
So when you talk about that parties intercept exactly.

Speaker 2 (01:00:45):
When you talk to the dun Lap about the game,
like the mckensicick, well was actually an interception.

Speaker 1 (01:00:51):
I just that team. There's a good nucleus of those
guys that have always stayed together, which I always find
kind of wild. You know, they those guys. I don't
think we'll ever see that nowadays with this transfer portal. Yeah,
the one and done free agent. You know, are you
shaking your head?

Speaker 3 (01:01:07):
Yeah? I don't. You don't get that I can kind
of understand them getting paid, but they ought to have
to They shouldn't be able to transfer every year. I mean,
they ought to sign some kind of a contract or
some kind of an agreement or something that that they
got to hang around. I think they had the best
intentions when they started this, but it just I don't

(01:01:28):
think they ever saw this was.

Speaker 2 (01:01:29):
Going to happen.

Speaker 1 (01:01:30):
Yeah, they missed on how to regulate it. We had guys,
We had kids that go into the football portal in December,
went to a new school, did springball there, and then
after springball put themselves back in the portal. So they
never even played the game with that school. Yeah, it's happened.

Speaker 3 (01:01:49):
All probably made money on it.

Speaker 1 (01:01:50):
Played money. Oh, sure made money three guys before the game.
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Speaker 5 (01:03:07):
Hurry up because good weather's coming.

Speaker 2 (01:03:09):
Got a dog on to almost Hey, that's seventy five.
Of course this is all familiar to Bill, but that's
seventy five team. It's just fun to go back and
look at some of the players. Dan Kendra quarterback on
that team, Artie Owens brad one hundred and fifty nine
carries for one thousand and fifty five yards back in
the day.

Speaker 5 (01:03:28):
Good yards per carry.

Speaker 2 (01:03:29):
Six point six, yeah, six point six. Dwayne Woods was
on that team, Steve Lewis, Scott McDonald, Tommy Bowden, Randy
Swinson who caught the pass in the pit game, Marshall,
Greg Yeah, Marshall, Tommy pride More. That was a stun lap.
That was a really good team, really good team. Did
you all you what was that? Yeah, Tony, you asked him.

(01:03:50):
I mean again, I guess as kickers you felt separated,
but had to be a pretty good vibe on that team, right,
Oh yeah.

Speaker 3 (01:03:56):
No, no, no, it was great. Great guys always yeah,
kind of yucking it up a fews a will. That
was a good team, a good team atmosphere.

Speaker 1 (01:04:06):
You know, you said a couple of those names, like,
for example, I read John Antonic has a book that's
coming out in the next couple of months on Bobby Bowden,
and there's a specific chapter you know what the chapter's
called Bill McKenzie's field goal. And I have seriously and
I have the advanced copy. You're at page one forty
five in case you didn't know. And I read that

(01:04:27):
this morning because I have an advanced copy and was
looking through that. And they mentioned the defensive plan they
had that day from Clausing, and he widened out the
defensive ends, basically everything to try to slow down Tony
dor Set and he said the safeties and specifically Tommy Pridemore.
His one job that day was to beat the absolute

(01:04:49):
heck out of Matt Kavanaugh. And every time he would
come on and either hold it or not hold it,
punish him and pound him. And he said that was
one of the big keys in that football and pride
more obviously went on to play really nice NFL career.

Speaker 2 (01:05:04):
Now back in the day, Brad, that would that would
not have resulted in a flag against the young man, right,
it was a different game.

Speaker 1 (01:05:14):
How about astro turf concrete on, you guys, this was
this is the same surface that he kicked off of
that was the worst.

Speaker 3 (01:05:24):
This was Mountaineer Field with a little bit of green
fuzzle on.

Speaker 1 (01:05:29):
Isn't that mind blowing how bad that stuff was? In
the beginning.

Speaker 3 (01:05:33):
Yeah, but that was that was it back then.

Speaker 1 (01:05:36):
I mean, so you went from natural grass at Warwood
with a regular.

Speaker 3 (01:05:42):
It was more dirt than grass.

Speaker 1 (01:05:46):
Yea, yeah, I get it. Dirt, I get it. So
you you were kicking off of dirt without a kicking shoe, right,
and then you come here and now you're on this
real high tech, brand new stuff they're calling it astro turf,
never seen before, and you're using the toe.

Speaker 3 (01:06:01):
Yeah, and I had a tea and the t you
could use t's back then, think.

Speaker 1 (01:06:06):
About yeah, think about that.

Speaker 2 (01:06:08):
Did it feel good coming off the toe? Probably did,
didn't it?

Speaker 3 (01:06:12):
Yeah? I mean you're if you've golfed, it's kind of
like hitting one and you know when you hit one
in the middle, you don't feel it. Same thing when
you hit one in the middle, you just you don't.

Speaker 2 (01:06:22):
You watch you watch the video. You see what do
you see? Brad kept his head down so you knew
you got it.

Speaker 5 (01:06:27):
Left the toe, you had it.

Speaker 3 (01:06:29):
It felt you felt like yeah, I was, I wasn't looking.

Speaker 5 (01:06:35):
Discipline head down?

Speaker 1 (01:06:36):
What was your protocol?

Speaker 2 (01:06:38):
Bear kicks?

Speaker 1 (01:06:39):
You know guys like the soccer style guys like they'll
go back three over three, like what was your what
was your deal?

Speaker 3 (01:06:45):
It's funny you mentioned it. I got two stories there.

Speaker 1 (01:06:47):
If I got a telephone.

Speaker 3 (01:06:51):
One of the things with the kick and tea, and
this came from Frank Nester. Frank said, you know, it's
a little bout the size of your phone. Maybe you're
not quite as high as your phone. We used a
one inch tea and pay. Frank said, paint a big
yellow arrow on it, big yellow arrow, and when you
get there, hold that up to the goalpost like this

(01:07:13):
and then just bring it straight down and then you
just look at the t arrow and that's where you
And I told the guys that and they said, yeah,
Frank was blind as a bat. No wonder, no wonder
he did that. But anyway, that's so one thing you didn't.
I don't know if I might have got Frank's t
I don't. I don't remember how the area got on there.

Speaker 4 (01:07:33):
There was a big, big arrow, would you yeah.

Speaker 3 (01:07:38):
Absolutely held it up. I got put it straight down
on the field. Yeah, you know, like if you're golfing
on your putton, when you line up that thing and
then you don't Yep, that's exactly what I did. That
came that little tidbit came from Frank Nester.

Speaker 1 (01:07:50):
So that was analog GPS.

Speaker 5 (01:07:53):
That's well, it's like another that's before a rangefinder, right
range finder. You just hold the tea up there, right
down there.

Speaker 3 (01:08:01):
But again they said Frank did that because he could
he couldn't see. Well, whether that's true or not, I don't.

Speaker 1 (01:08:07):
So his eligibility was over when you and so he
was a g A or something like that. He was
on staff.

Speaker 3 (01:08:12):
I think he graduated seventy two. I think.

Speaker 1 (01:08:16):
Okay, so he was still around.

Speaker 3 (01:08:17):
I think yeah, he was still Yeah, he was still
around again. Got the square toed shoe, got the little
arrow thing he there that helped.

Speaker 2 (01:08:25):
Yeah, No, Frankly, I think he could have given you
more of a ringing endorsement before the kick into a
Kensey's got didn't Ifie boots it there?

Speaker 3 (01:08:33):
Yeah? Yeah, well I said earlier, they said I was.
They said practice wasn't the night before wasn't very good.
I don't remember. Yeah, thankfully, I wasn't thinking about that. Yeah,
I don't. I don't.

Speaker 2 (01:08:49):
Do you ever think it? And again we're belaboring the point,
but it's so such a meaningful moment. Did you ever
over the years. Think about what if you'd missed it.

Speaker 3 (01:08:58):
It would be a I wouldn't be here.

Speaker 1 (01:09:00):
I know that that's true. I mean it would become
an after.

Speaker 3 (01:09:04):
The would be a whole different world.

Speaker 1 (01:09:06):
Yeah, it'd be an afterthought.

Speaker 2 (01:09:07):
Yeah, it would have been.

Speaker 3 (01:09:09):
Just like you mentioned about the obituary, I don't really
want to go there.

Speaker 4 (01:09:12):
Did it ever come up in your in your work
and your professional career dealings. Did that ever come as
a ice breaker in any of your conversations as you
were moving so much?

Speaker 3 (01:09:21):
Or no, I don't well again when I come back
to Weirton. Yeah, you know, I mentioned all of those
shows when I came back to Weirton. Obviously everybody knew
me for that, but people in Philadelphia and Hamilton, Ontario,
no big deal. Yeah.

Speaker 5 (01:09:34):
Plus, you really couldn't pluy YouTube up in those early days.

Speaker 1 (01:09:37):
Later, you know, in reading the chapter in the book
that John's got coming out here, there was some question
of Johnny Major as the pit coach, why he just
didn't settle for the tie, just run it out and
get it over with and just call it a tie,
see you later. And that's he gave the ball back

(01:09:57):
to West Virginia.

Speaker 3 (01:09:58):
And that's he probably saw me practicing it.

Speaker 2 (01:10:05):
It doesn't matter.

Speaker 1 (01:10:06):
I'm making it anyway.

Speaker 3 (01:10:06):
We'll get to like two for your heard him say,
you know two for five in field goals.

Speaker 1 (01:10:12):
I mean, yeah.

Speaker 3 (01:10:14):
So I don't know why they didn't call a timeout
try to freeze you. M I don't know if it
would well. Again, I only had one other game then.
I remember that I made a last second field but
we beat Richmond one year, nine to six. I think
it was like ten or twelve seconds or something like
something like that left and they did call it time out,

(01:10:35):
but I made it anyway. So whether that would have
helped it, I don't know.

Speaker 5 (01:10:39):
Bill.

Speaker 1 (01:10:39):
Do you remember? Was it was it chaotic? The way
that it happened, As I said, it was just the
past of Swinson that's a ten second drive. Was there
chaos on the sideline Like he catches it, he runs
out of bounds. It's like kick kick kick, and you're
just like go.

Speaker 3 (01:10:53):
Oh yeah, no, We're running around like chickens with their
head cut off.

Speaker 2 (01:10:56):
There.

Speaker 3 (01:10:56):
It's like, oh my god, what just happened?

Speaker 1 (01:10:57):
So it just happens to you like you literally like
ball out of bounce, you just run out. You don't
even know what you're doing. Kicker puts it, holder puts
it down, you're kicking.

Speaker 3 (01:11:04):
It's over pretty much. Well, you know, I don't want
to belabor the issue here, but they still got the
ball with eleven seconds to go. I mean I'm walking around,
you know, picking up my shoe making sure I got
got you. So, like everybody kind of was nobody expected.

Speaker 2 (01:11:20):
Some people were even thinking about leaving the game. Was
U was Swinson in bounds? Did he catch it in bounds?

Speaker 3 (01:11:26):
I was on the other side of the field.

Speaker 2 (01:11:27):
It was on the other side of the field.

Speaker 1 (01:11:28):
Was in bound? Sure it was? Yeah, he was in
a question.

Speaker 3 (01:11:31):
I didn't know there was even a question.

Speaker 1 (01:11:32):
He didn't even know it was a question. Fifty years later,
you're trying to dredge up some stuff over there, all right,
that's fine, you know. That may be why Jack said,
like he get I think they say, does he say,
holy Moly, there's something holy whatever, because probably he never
thought in his mind that we were West Virginia was
going to get an opportunity to get a kick.

Speaker 5 (01:11:52):
I can't believe it.

Speaker 1 (01:11:52):
I don't believe this.

Speaker 3 (01:11:53):
I don't know. I don't know what you guys do
in the press box. But he was probably gathering his
papers together and gathering his paper make sure he had
his glasses. I don't know.

Speaker 1 (01:12:01):
I will tell you this. I will tell you this,
and this is true, and Hopy knows this. He hated
pitt oh so bad, like he would hop me. I
mean he would. He would have to take a little
something up. He would take a little something, a little
pill before a pit game, just to take the edge
off so he wouldn't get so ramped up. Because that's
how much you hated them.

Speaker 2 (01:12:22):
That's true.

Speaker 1 (01:12:23):
What is a little something?

Speaker 3 (01:12:24):
What a great guy though?

Speaker 1 (01:12:26):
Oh yeah, just unbelievable, just unbelievable. Three guys before the
game is brought to us by the good folks at
Tutor's Biscuit World, And right now they're in the midst
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(01:12:47):
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(01:13:07):
franchise are available, Yeah, they are franchise franchise. You can
put them right near the golf course. Those guys they
don't know what a too good Tutors biscuit is. You
pull right in there before you could tee off, get
yourself a Tutor's biscuit franchise oper. There is put one
of those right in Arizona, just like it's just like Arizona.
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(01:13:28):
to hydrate that grass a little bit. But other than that, that.

Speaker 3 (01:13:31):
Kind of looks like the clouds we have in Arizona.
There there's contrails from airplanes. Yeah, that's about it. That's
about there. Any clouds you get out there, do.

Speaker 1 (01:13:39):
You come do you try to come back to watch
the Mountaineers play at all? Football? You don't get you
don't come into in the fall.

Speaker 3 (01:13:44):
Yeah again every now and then I wouldn't obviously, you
know us have a big r V. We used to
come all the time till we sure, till we moved
Arizona full time. My daughter comes, my brother comes on
every game.

Speaker 1 (01:13:56):
Does your so through the years, has your daughter giving
you any Hey, dad, someone found out that I was
your daughter. Have you got some of those?

Speaker 3 (01:14:05):
Yeah? My son too again Wheeling. Yeah, he's in Wheeling.
I'm from Wheelings. Every now and then he said, you know,
I met somebody that said they went to school with
you and the kick.

Speaker 2 (01:14:14):
Are they doing anything this fall? Is the athletics director planning?

Speaker 1 (01:14:20):
I don't know if it were. I mean, they never
met they are, Yes, Okay, they never miss I was
gonna say they never missed the I'm sure.

Speaker 3 (01:14:25):
We're supposed to have a I think it's a Bowden team.
All all the members of a Bowden team, So it's
not just seventy five that's what was here. Seventy Yeah,
two seventy six or something like that.

Speaker 1 (01:14:37):
Six seasons.

Speaker 3 (01:14:38):
Yeah, they're supposed to have get together. It's one of
the later games. I think it's sometime in October. You'll
be here, Oh yeah, it's one of the later one
of the leaders, and then I'll be here for the
pit game.

Speaker 1 (01:14:48):
He's got I think that good pick game. Yeah, recreate
the kick, to recreate the kick, well, hoppy, it's not
I mean it's that was a pretty good shot. That
wasn't like it wasn't like ten yards. It was a shot.
It's hard to do. No, that would be neat if
you had that shoe like you know how they do
those when your little kids they Yeah, I wonder where

(01:15:11):
the hell the shoe is. Probably Kershner's probably got it.

Speaker 3 (01:15:18):
He's holding out for that dollars.

Speaker 1 (01:15:21):
I got the shoe. Yeah, when I get that dog
on two hundred dollars, McKenzie's getting his shoe back.

Speaker 2 (01:15:27):
By the way, I looked up the I love this stuff.
On the play before the past of Swinston, it was
a fake drawl, faked the draw to Artie Owens, tucked it,
pull it back out its Swinston. Yeah, got out of bounce.

Speaker 1 (01:15:40):
Well, John Antonio play action there well.

Speaker 3 (01:15:43):
And I think according to I believe that was a
play made up as you go. I don't think that
was a game.

Speaker 1 (01:15:51):
That's in the book.

Speaker 5 (01:15:52):
That's the time to improvise.

Speaker 1 (01:15:54):
Basically, he said no one knew no one except the
quarterback and the receiver. He based he was running a
specific route all game and so they were they were,
they were biting in on it, and so he said, okay,
pretend you're going to do that and then cut and
that's what took him to the sideline. Is that right?
So they were the only ones that knew.

Speaker 4 (01:16:12):
That took some uh oh yeah, gumption to make that
call on your own.

Speaker 1 (01:16:16):
Yeah, I mean what you got to do that? So
what have we accomplished here today? It's a good thing.
Rocky g and Alla broke his leg. It's a good thing.
Bernie Kershner was on double secret probation, so he can. Right,
all of these things are true. It's good.

Speaker 3 (01:16:32):
You know if I can. I had everybody sign that
ball back then you cannot read any name. You cannot
read any name on it. And what amazes me is
they show pictures of a Babe Ruth baseball. Now, how
in the world can you still see Babe Ruth signature

(01:16:52):
on a ball? Yeah, you can't see not a one
on not a one on that football.

Speaker 1 (01:16:57):
Probably probably because it's some guy in New Jersey like
in the ninety nine that.

Speaker 3 (01:17:01):
Had a sharp Yeah. Again that was before you know,
it was all ballpoint pen. But that amazes old.

Speaker 2 (01:17:08):
School, old school I gotta tell you, Tony, We've been
doing this for a long time and all these shows
and just it is a great joy for me fifty
years later to be with this guy.

Speaker 1 (01:17:18):
This is why we did it.

Speaker 2 (01:17:19):
It's really it's really enjoy it.

Speaker 1 (01:17:22):
That's what the summer series is all about. Man. We
can't thank you enough for your time.

Speaker 3 (01:17:26):
Oh hey, great, thanks, thanks again having me.

Speaker 1 (01:17:29):
You're in our ears every single night when we start
our show with that call from Jack. It's iconic. It's
a piece of West Virginia history, and it's absolutely fantastic.
Thanks so much, thank.

Speaker 3 (01:17:42):
You, thank you.

Speaker 1 (01:17:43):
There he is the guy Bill McKenzie on Three Guys
Before the Game. We're out, Thanks so much for being
with us. Three Guys Before the Game is brought to
us by well, the fine fine folks at Jan Dill's
Attorneys at Law. They won't take no for a answer.
By Comac's Business Systems, keeping West Virginia's business data safe,

(01:18:04):
secure and efficient for twenty five years and hydrated. Three
Guys brought to us by Gomart. Get that Gomart rewards card,
download their app, go to the app store. Just go
to gomart dot com for the details. By Lou Wendell
Marine at sales in Saint Albans. They sell family Fund
Visit Louwndelmarne Sales dot com. By Tutor's Biscuit World starts

(01:18:25):
your day the homemade way with a Tutor's Biscuit and
by Conley CPA Group providing value beyond numbers. That'll do
it for us for Hoppy brad Our, special guest Bill
McKenzie and our producer mister Jake. We're out three guys
before the game, episode number six hundred and thirty nine
in the books. We'll see you

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3 Guys Before The Game - Bill McKenzie Visits (Episode 639)

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.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}3 Guys Before The Game - Bill McKenzie Visits (Episode 639)