On a rain-soaked night July 26 during the Opening Ceremony of the Summer Olympics, a college student who only a few years ago was roaming the halls of Philomath High School found himself on the streets of Paris shooting watch party footage to try to capture the excitement of the Games.
The weather conditions were not ideal for high-tech equipment. A garbage bag kept the camera dry. Coats were used to protect cellphones and computers from the elements. And the rain wouldn’t let up as it continued to pour.
Blake Niemann, who graduated with the PHS Class of 2022 and is a sports journalism student at Arizona State University, loved every minute of it.
“As the night wore on, the energy continued to grow,” Niemann said. “People began dancing, began singing, just were all coming together. And these are people from all different countries watching the Opening Ceremony waiting for their country to be announced.”
He called that evening his favorite memory from the three-week stay in France.
There were interviews with people from Puerto Rico, Congo and Charlotte, North Carolina. And he pushed through the conditions to get the story.
“The story ended up becoming one of the better ones I produced on the trip,” he said. “It was super cool to be a part of that environment and how everyone, despite the damp weather, still made it a bright night and a night that I will never forget.”
Niemann, 20, covered a variety of sports at the Olympics, including women’s basketball, men’s basketball (full team and 3-on-3) and gymnastics. He also did pieces on cultural aspects of Paris and put together a feature on an Arizona-based wrestling club that had five alumni on Team USA.
Interview subjects included basketball stars Devin Booker, Kevin Durant, Brittney Griner and Diana Taurasi — all of those players on Phoenix teams — as well as gymnastics standout Jade Carey, an Arizona native who competes collegiately at Oregon State (and lives off campus in Philomath). They all won gold medals.
“Covering a variety of different sports where I do different aspects of the culture, it really helped me work on my versatility and push me to new heights in my reporting,” Niemann said.
This past fall, ASU’s Walter Cronkite School of Journalism started promoting the Olympics opportunity. Niemann believes there were over 70 applicants for the 24 available spots.
“I got a notification at the end of January that I was going to be one of the ones selected to go to Paris and I was just over the moon,” Niemann said. “When I found out that I was going to be part of this team going to cover the biggest sporting event in the world, it was just a shock, a dream come true.”
The Olympics ran from July 26 to Aug. 11 and Niemann was on hand for the full run — arriving July 22 and leaving Aug. 12 on the day after the Closing Ceremony. He stayed in a Paris hostel located about 30 minutes from the Eiffel Tower.
Niemann returned to the Bend Elks this summer to handle play-by-play duties. His final broadcast with the West Coast League club before leaving for Paris came in Corvallis with his idol, broadcaster Mike Parker, when the Elks played the Corvallis Knights.
“Following my senior year at Philomath High School, I interned with the Knights and then ultimately after my freshman year at Arizona State, broadcasted for the Elks and then came back to the Elks this summer,” he said. “So it was really a full circle moment for me after three years of being part of the West Coast League.”
Niemann earned three college credits for the work in Paris. He will graduate a year early this coming spring with a bachelor of arts degree in sports journalism.
In this final year on the Tempe campus, Niemann will cover Sun Devils football, work with the local 247Sports.com affiliate and serve as president of the student-run Walter Cronkite Sports Network. He’ll also be doing multi-sport play-by-play broadcast work and on the TV side, his wrestling coverage will be among the content streamed on ESPN+.
Said Niemann, “It’s a lot of exciting stuff coming up and I’m just looking to soak up the last little bit here at Arizona State before I begin my career in journalism.”
PHS cagers on tourney-winning team
A 3-on-3 basketball team with Philomath athletes took first place in the 15-and-under moderate division at last weekend’s Hoop Jam, an annual tournament hosted by the Boys & Girls Club of Albany.
The Reverse Oreos featured local players Kaden Howard, Jamin Peters and Esias Sapp. A fourth player, Alston Young of Corvallis, competed with the PHS boys.
The team finished second in its pool with a 2-1 record — defeating Top Flight (30-8) and Albany Elite (30-13) and falling to Ball Hogs Elite (30-20). In bracket play, the Philomath team upended Duke Dennis Elite by a 19-13 score. In the semifinals, Reverse Oreos defeated Albany Elite’s Black team, 21-20. That put the team in the championship game against Bulldog Ballers, which upset Ball Hogz Elite in the semis.
The local team rolled to a 30-21 victory to claim the division’s top trophy. Colton Howard and Zoee Howard were coaches.
Kaden Howard, Peters and Sapp will all be sophomores this coming season for the Warriors. Young will be a sophomore at Corvallis High.
(Brad Fuqua is publisher/editor of the Philomath News. He can be reached at News@PhilomathNews.com).