The Louisville Football program has reportedly banned all of the local mainstream media from covering the team for the time being. According to a few of the local sports reporters, Charlie Strong and company felt that there was not enough coverage of his team during the spring practices. With both the Louisville and Kentucky basketball programs making it to the Final Four, there was hardly any coverage from the local television stations and newspapers.
At this point, the ban is only on the local Louisville area television stations. From what I understand, national media and local websites/blogs will still be able to cover the team.
I realize when Louisville and Kentucky are both making runs in the NCAA tournament, that is going to dominate the local news. However, I have to admit, as much as I was caught up the Louisville’s Final Four run, I did notice that nobody at the local TV stations were showing much love to Coach Strong and his team. I can’t say I necessarily agree with the decision, but I do see the point. Coach Strong and his staff have done a great job at building this program in their first two seasons. Louisville football is relevant once again and for Spring Ball to come around and the news stations not mention the team much at all, is sort of a slap in the face. Especially when Strong has his team possibly breaking into the pre-season top 25 polls.
I’ll admit, I probably could have done a better job at covering spring ball, but at least we were covering some of the open practices on the site. Certain news stations didn’t mention Louisville’s spring practices one time over the past few weeks. I don’t think it’s fair to say that the local sports reporters dont’ do a good job, but I think it would have been fine to have at least one person from each station stay home during the NCAA tournament and cover some of the practices. I know a lot of people don’t agree with me, but I think some of the sports reporters in this town get a bad wrap.
I think Charlie Strong is simply making a statement and he absolutely has the right to do that.
April 9, 2012 at 11:43 pm
once Charlie Strong realizes we are a BASKETBALL STATE and not football state he will be much better. UL and UK playing each other in the FINAL FOUR off all games and he worried about media coverage?.worry about making it to a BCS game instead of jupiter bowl
April 10, 2012 at 1:04 pm
I agree with the ban. I’ve always had a problem with the local paper not covering enough of U Of L and in general the local sports. It seems so much is always dedicated to the school to the east. It’s not wrong to be a homer, feel U of L always get neglected. Home town paper should follow home town schools, not look for approval for a school down the road.
April 10, 2012 at 1:04 pm
I agree with the ban. I’ve always had a problem with the local paper not covering enough of U Of L and in general the local sports. It seems so much is always dedicated to the school to the east. It’s not wrong to be a homer, feel U of L always get neglected. Home town paper should follow home town schools, not look for approval for a school down the road.
April 11, 2012 at 11:38 am
He absolutely has the right to feel that way. He is building a dandy program that has an easy road to the NCG thru the Big East. Recruiting is off the charts considering the program and all the Locals want to talk about is a basketball program that is no where near as storied as they want people to believe.
Charlie Strong is a real Gem and knows what it takes to build a National Power House, but all the Local Media can talk about is a washed up coach in Petino and the antics of Petrino…..now that basketball is over, they are talking about basketball recruiting…..Really it’s sickening to think the way this is being covered. The question that I have is…”if Petrino was Coach today…would the local media treat his program the same way”? Nothing racist intended or implied…solely off the merits.