Remembering Bill Teegins
Published: 1/26/2011 1:58 PM
Last Modified: 1/26/2011 1:58 PM
On the day after the OSU plane crash, the writing of a Bill Teegins piece was among my assignments. Nearly every member of the Tulsa World sports department was in the newsroom on that Sunday, and everyone was devastated about what had transpired in Colorado. My report centered on the reaction of other media members to the death of Teegins, who graduated from Hale High School and the University of Tulsa:
Colleagues mourn for Teegins
By BILL HAISTEN World Sports Writer
Published: 1/29/2001
In a state in which so many sports allegiances are absolutely OSU or absolutely OU, and in a business that is extremely competitive and occasionally even cutthroat in nature, Bill Teegins seems to have achieved the impossible.
It seems he was liked by everyone.
Media colleagues expressed shock over the loss of Teegins, the sports director at Oklahoma City's KWTV channel 9 and six-time Oklahoma Sportscaster of the Year who was among the 10 members of the Oklahoma State University basketball party who perished in Saturday's plane crash in Colorado.
"When I first heard there had been an accident, Bill was the first person I thought of," said KJRH channel 2 news anchor John Walls, who was sports director at KTUL channel 8 from 1984-90 and competed with Teegins, who was at KOTV channel 6 from 1981-87. "Within 30 seconds, I'm thinking, `Oh, my God. Bill's probably going to be on that plane.'
"You can hear his voice and see his face, and you just wonder what he was thinking when it went down. It's haunting. It just kicks you in the teeth and reminds you of what's important. It reminds you to make time for your family and friends."
"I've had some personal difficulties, and Bill told me to call him any time," said Joe Riddle, a Tulsan who has been a producer and engineer on the Cowboy radio network since 1987. "I called him at 3 a.m. one night, and we talked a couple of hours. Bill was a genuine guy and a real friend to me. He was on my personal board of directors. He mattered to me. I can't believe he's gone. It's shattering."
A St. Paul, Minn., native who moved to Tulsa at age 12 and was a graduate of Hale High School and the University of Tulsa, Teegins was in his 10th year as the radio play-by-play voice of the OSU football and basketball teams. He also hosted University of Oklahoma coaches' shows on television, but, as Sooner basketball coach Kelvin Sampson points out, Teegins' association with OSU didn't seem to bother OU fans, and vice versa.
"When I think of Bill Teegins, I think he transcends the rivalry between the two schools," Sampson said. "He was the most unbiased, most fair, most easy-going, most easy-to-be-around sportscaster I ever met. He epitomized professionalism."
Teegins began his television career in Amarillo, Texas, in 1975 and was there six years before joining the Channel 6 staff. He did color on TU's football broadcasts in 1983.
"Billy was a good friend and a mentor of mine at Channel 6," said Bob Stevens, who was a weekend anchor at KOTV before succeeding Teegins as sports director in 1987.
"I regret that I didn't take time to call Billy after the Orange Bowl excitement," added Stevens, who now is a SportsCenter anchor for ESPN in Bristol, Conn.
A member of the KWTV news staff said funeral arrangements hadn't been finalized as of Sunday night. Teegins, age 48 and a resident of Edmond, is survived by his wife, Janis, a flight attendant for Delta Airlines; and daughter Amanda, a student at St. Cloud State University in Minnesota.
"The first year he did play-by-play was 1991, when OSU was 0-10-1 in football," Riddle recalled. "Bill used to say, `The team was terrible, and I was worse.' He did become a very good play-by-play man. In basketball, he really shined and developed a style, like when he'd say `he got it!' after someone would hit a shot.
"He had a great sense of humor. Before every broadcast, he'd turn to me and say, `Let's do this one in English.' He would tell me, `Wouldn't it be great if we could just do this, and nothing else? Not do any other kind of job. Just this.' That's how much he loved broadcasting the games."
Channel 6 sports director John Holcomb and Teegins co-hosted an Orange Bowl special on Jan. 2 from Miami, Fla.
"We were wandering around the hotel after the show, looking for something to eat, and out of nowhere Bill says, `Don't you miss your wife and daughter? Man, I'd really like to be home right now.' I know his family meant a lot to him," Holcomb said. "To be considered a nice guy in this business, you can't take yourself too seriously. He was very quick to make fun of himself.
"One year at Dallas Cowboy training camp, everyone was doing a Herschel Walker piece after Herschel had come back to the Cowboys. When Bill did his story, he said, `Herschel and I have something in common. He does a thousand pushups a day. I've done one pushup a day for a thousand days.' Bill obviously didn't take himself too seriously, but he was very good at what he did."
Walls was Teegins' partner during that '91 OSU football season.
"It was a miserable season to watch, but I've never had any more fun working because of the relationship with Bill," Walls said. "We were already good friends. We became great friends that season.
"It sounds cliche to say, but it didn't matter what side of the fence you were on, you liked Bill Teegins. It didn't matter if you were a Cowboy or Sooner or whatever. He was just so likable and fair and so balanced in his broadcasts."
-- Bill Haisten
Written by
Bill Haisten
Sports Writer
