the name of Jesus Christ … Amen” and with the crowd giving it’s “amen”, Elder Perry handed the microphone back to me, extended his left hand to pat my shoulder and then returned to his seat. I immediately boarded in with announcing the starting six players of the Pepperdine Wave team on the left side of the court. Just name and position was all, then, “and the head coach of the Pepperdine Waves … Marv Dunphy”! That was followed by another roar from the crowd.
Now from here … everything went a bit off the rails.
***
When you have the opening night of any sporting event, you only have one chance to get it right. Such is life. So for weeks I was planning something … spectacular. Something that would put the Cougars on the Volleyball map for a decade. Something that had never been done before at any BYU athletic event.
Remember that I had been prowling the halls of the BYU Music Department? That is where I found the barbershop quartet. But that was an afterthought. I was really looking for were lighting technicians, who could illuminate the inside of Smith Fieldhouse in a way that has never been done before. I was lucky to come across one crusty old fellow, buried in the basement of the building who grinned ear to ear when I told him what my warped brain was considering turning into reality. The biggest issue was not if it could be done, but if anything went wrong in a building as old as Smith Fieldhouse, I stood to black out not only the BYU Campus and possibly the entire energy grid of Utah Valley in doing so. That would have been bad. Getting his triple re-assurance that I would not blow every circuit in the arena, I used the last of the meager $500 that McGown had given me as a marketing budget and hired four lighting technicians, arranged for all of their stage lighting equipment to be delivered three hours before the match was to begin (remember about being there at 4:00 p.m.) and paid them all - in advance - for their services.
I’m a believer in paying for things in advance. I will cook 4 kg of Southern Fried Chicken and freeze it just so I know that I have it. I will pay my rent for three months in advance. Yada. Yada. In this case, I had no issue paying the student technicians in advance, as well as their truckers to haul all of the equipment in and the helping hands to lift everything in place.
Let’s rewind the clock for just a second.
Three days before the match against Pepperdine was set to begin, McGown introduced me to his Volleyball players. They were sitting in the lower stands of the Fieldhouse and in front of them I explained every detail that was going to transpire on opening night. I could see their collective chins dropping when I explained how the team was going to be introduced. Then I introduced my “secret weapon” … the resident janitor and I explained his time-critical role. To me, he was the most important person in the arena. Not the BYU players and certainly not McGown nor his coaching staff as they were just passengers on my bus.
I would either make it to Heaven or crash and burn.
***
So as soon as the Pepperdine Waves team was introduced, the banging and cheering and the NOISE level ramped up to a fevered pitch. My blood pressure was about to burst my heart out of my chest and eight seconds later, the Smith Fieldhouse went dark.
As black as your bedroom at 3:30 a.m.
Four indoor searchlights then fired-up, all simultaneously bursting onto the BYU Inaugural Banner hanging over center court.
The crowd EXPLODED!
The noise level was deafening. Just as I expected it would be. Then I pressed THE button. Not just any button but that of a cassette tape that was hard wired into the Fieldhouse’s massive sound system. The music fired up and the internal spotlights circled the banner and then rotated into the crowd like a Hollywood premier. This lasted for only 34 seconds but for me it was an eternity. I have seen this one moment in time from every angle of the building. In my mind, I have seen it 1,000 times from everywhere; from every corner of the Fieldhouse. From a fan’s perspective on the last row of the arena ... to sitting next to Elder Perry on the front row.
The song that I used? After endless hours of soul-searching, I finally decided it would be Oh Yea, the theme song by Yello from the movie, Ferris Bueller's Day Off.
I had timed two others; the first was “Something Happened on the Way to Heaven” by Phil Collins and the second was “Always on My Mind” by the Pet Shop Boys. In hindsight, I probably should have gone with the Pet Shop Boys but there was only a non-singing element of the British Duo’s song for the first 35 seconds. About the same time period for Phil Collins as well. After that, I would be competing against these singers on the public address system, so finding the right music to introduce the Cougars starting six was absolutely critical. Once the searchlights crisscrossed the arena, I went back to the microphone and said, “And now, let’s welcome the starting line-up of YOUR BYU COUGARS”.
And then the crowd really went nuts.
So, I slowly lowered the volume of the tape recorder with my left hand and held a flashlight in my right so I could read the starting line-up of the BYU team. Not being able to read the names of the starting lineup for BYU would have equally have been bad. Finally the spotlights rested on Carl McGown for his introduction and two seconds later, the house lights were turned back on.
Wow.
So, let's get back to the janitor. Well, the only person I could trust and the only person who had the keys to the circuit breakers for the arena was the janitor, Stuart Randolph. Without him, this could never have been pulled off. Here’s why. Immediately after I said the name “Marv Dunphy”, I had planned with Randolph, in advance, that he was to pull the circuit breakers and kill all lights in the Smith Fieldhouse. The problem was that he couldn’t hear me say Dunphy’s name over the public address system because of the noise from the crowd. Since he couldn’t hear my cue, Randolph sprinted from his position at the electric power grid to the entrance of the arena, saw that the Pepperdine team has already been announced, and then pivoted and ran back to hit the master switch.
That took eight very long seconds and let me tell you, eight seconds can be a lifetime. But the anticipation by the crowd for the announcement of the BYU team only made the impact of the spotlights that much more dramatic. For you see, the lighting technicians were under strict orders not to turn on their spotlights until the house lights went off. So in hindsight, the delay by Randolph in darkening the arena worked out for the best. The emotional impact of the darkened arena, interior spotlights with pounding rock music created exactly what I was hoping for. The opening night of BYU Volleyball was not just another Volleyball match but a major sporting event; a spectacular opening of NCAA Volleyball in Provo, Utah that no one that had seen it would ever forget.
But I keep thinking about the Pet Shop Boys. Certainly this means nothing to the people attending the match but it did for me. I am sure the emotional impact to the spectators would not have changed. Once the opening introductory festivities ended, it came down to the match and as I thought, the Cougars were crushed in three straight games. With the match over, I made the rounds to thank everyone who was involved in the pre-match festivities, especially with Elder Perry.
It can’t hurt making friends with a man who talks with God on a daily basis.
As I was mulling around on center court, a stocky gentleman came up to me, introduced himself and we chatted for a few minutes and offered me a concept that not only would end up changing my life forever but brought me to four Olympiads, including the Beijing Summer Olympics.
His name is Bob McGregor.
***
A native Hawaiian,
