Ron Mossotti
Ron Mossotti wasn’t going to cheer as he sat courtside in 2010, while Gordon Hayward’s half-court shot inched perilously close to the rim. His unwavering refusal to be a fan wasn’t just because, as a member of the communications team, it would be improper of him to do so. No, Mossotti was trying to figure out how he was going to get away from the court at Indianapolis’s Lucas Oil Stadium unscathed.
“I never felt that much energy in a building,” Mossotti said, speaking of the 30 straight Final Fours he and his company Hammond Communications Group have been a part of since first getting involved with the NCAA Tournament when Lexington hosted the 1985 Final Four. “I was literally looking for my escape route, because I knew the fans were coming over the wall right behind me as I was sitting at the scorer’s table, and I was thinking, ‘Uh-oh, this is not good.’”
Luckily for him — but unfortunately for Kentucky basketball fans who wanted to see Duke fall victim to the least expected champion in NCAA Tournament history — the game-winning attempt rimmed out at the buzzer, as Butler lost in its hometown by two.
That night, as is the case in all 67 games of the NCAA Tournament, Hammond Communications employees and contractors captured the game action and press conferences for use by the multitudes of TV and web-based news outlets that need sound and video to cover March Madness.
Figuring It Out
Mossotti admitted he didn’t exactly know what he was being asked to do when approached by Host Communications ahead of the 1985 Final Four to provide the press-pool feed, but he and those at the company he founded with NBC sportscaster Tom Hammond figured it out.
“After Lexington, we did the next several Final Fours, and then they began adding the men’s regionals and then the woman’s regionals and then the early rounds,” Mossotti said about the expansion of the company’s association with the NCAA. Now, he said, “we’re doing all the rounds for the men’s and we start the women at the regional level.”
To do that, Mossotti and his team log a lot of miles, hours and days working.
Not Leisurely
“That’s not the kind of leisurely basketball watching that would attract many people, if they knew what went into it,” he said. “It’s a long haul the first week because of the TV schedules and such. It gets a little bit easier for the regionals and for the Final Four; there’s a lot of downtime.”
But for the first week of the tournament, which follows crews pulling the same duties at the men’s and women’s SEC and Big Ten Tournaments, “we go into the arena about nine in the morning and come out at about one in the morning,” he said.
Eight full-time Hammond employees supervise crews mixed of Lexington-area part-timers, contractors and freelancers picked up in other cities, while some venues require in-house union personnel who shoot other games and events in the local arena. For that, Hammond provides the technician and producer.
Redundant Broadcaster
In addition, if for some reason the broadcast feed from CBS, the Turner family of networks that covers men’s NCAA Tournament games, or the ESPN feed from the women’s championship, happens to fail, it’s the Hammond crew’s video feed that takes over as a contingency.
“It’s just a built-in redundancy that kicks in automatically should their satellite transmission fail. That’s probably one of the lesser tasks we have,” he said about their need to broadcast the games to millions at home if the main feed fails. “We also transmit the press conferences [the day before the] game and after game, and so it’s that information that [local TV stations] can download and make it part of their news.”
If Not For Lexington
Mossotti credits his company’s longevity to those who helped bring Lexington the Final Four in 1985.
“To me, it really bodes well to those visionaries in town, and back in that day, it was Jim Host and all the fellas who came together and said, ‘If we can get the Final Four here to Lexington, it will pay all sorts of dividends for years to come,’” he said. “A small company is asked to do something one time for not a whole lot of money and then it turns into something that sustains our company and has for years. So it’s very, very important to us.”
About Ron Mossotti
Title: President, Hammond Communications Group
Age: 61
Hometown: Syracuse, N.Y.
Education: Eastern Kentucky University, criminal justice
Previously: Officer with the Lexington Division of Police