(September 25, 2013) The Stockton Thunder will have a pair of new voices on their broadcasts this season and both are STAA clients. Caleb Lamb takes over as the team’s play-by-play voice and Director of Broadcasting and Media Relations. Brandon Kisker will serve as color analyst and media relations assistant.
The duo replaces Mike Benton, who moved onto the Alaska Aces last month. Both the Thunder and the Aces skate in the ECHL.
Lamb is a 2013 graduate of Syracuse University. He was ranked as the third best collegiate sports broadcaster in the country in STAA’s 2013 Jim Nantz Award and All-America program.
“The ECHL is a great league to start out in, especially for someone like me who wants to do hockey play-by-play,” says Lamb. “It’s an affiliated league so there’s still that connection with the AHL and NHL and the teams and players in those leagues. It’s a more organized league than some of the smaller ones out there and there’s plenty of fan interest. I’ll get to call competitive games with a high level of talent with plenty of future NHL players on the ice.”
Kisker is a 2012 graduate of the University of Cincinnati and was as the voice of Bearcats ice hockey for three seasons. He spent the 2011-2012 season as a broadcast and community hockey intern with the Tampa Bay Lightning.
“This is a great experience to continue learning and growing not only as a broadcaster, digital media, web, and media relations employee, but also as a teammate and person,” says Kisker. “I’m approaching this opportunity just as I did when I started with the Tampa Bay Lightning. I want to be a sponge and soak up all that I can in anything I can, so that I can contribute positively to the Thunder organization.
“I’ll do anything I can to assist the team and do whatever is asked of me. It’s a unique situation that Caleb and I find ourselves in and if we work together with a “team first” mentality, then all parties involved will benefit from this experience.”
The STAA duo joins a franchise that is coming off its best season – a trip to the Kelly Cup finals. “The Thunder has consistently been in the top five in the league in terms of attendance, and they’ve got a great arena,” says Lamb. “I’m particularly looking forward to seeing how returning leading scorer Ryan Hayes does. He’s an alumnus of the Syracuse Stars, one of the hockey teams I called games for, for the last four years.”
Kisker has been an STAA client since spring of 2012. Lamb joined earlier this year.
“STAA’s been great for helping me to improve the way I apply for jobs,” says Lamb. “Having just graduated from Syracuse, I’d had plenty of experience calling games for different teams as an intern, but didn’t necessarily know the best way to get that experience across to employers. Working with [STAA CEO Jon Chelesnik] helped especially with writing good cover letters. And my STAA Talent Page allowed me to have a simple link to send to employers, rather than trying to cram things into a one-page resume with large demo MP3 attachments.”
Lamb admits it will be a tough task replacing Benton, who was with the Thunder since the team’s inception. However, it is a challenge he is embracing. He also feels a special kinship with Thunder fans following the team’s loss in the finals last year. “I experienced something similar as an intern calling games for the Syracuse Crunch, who lost in the AHL’s Calder Cup finals last year. So hopefully there’s a championship banner coming in the near future.”