Don Vincent
Don Vincent has been a fixture on the airwaves covering Lorain County high school sports since 1999. He has been a play-by-play voice for WOBL & WDLW for high school football and basketball since 2001. Don has also been behind the microphone for Oberlin College football broadcasts since 2002. He has also been a part of several Associated Press Best in Ohio awards with WOBL and WDLW. In 2017, Don became the Sports Director at WOBL and WDLW. Five years later, in 2022, Don received the Jim Allen Award, presented by the Lorain County Athletic Administrators Association. More recently, in 2024, Don was inducted into the Lorain County Boys Basketball Coaches Hall of Fame.
Throughout his time on air in Lorain County, Don’s focus has been to turn the spotlight onto local student athletes, celebrating their achievements and providing local sports fans with the opportunity to join in their successes. That led to the stations sponsoring the Golden Helmet, Mr & Miss Basketball and Mr. Baseball and Miss Softball awards starting in 2022 and continuing today.
Don was a two-sport high school athlete at Lorain Southview High School, earning All-Conference and All-County honors playing football, while also playing basketball for Hall of Fame Coach Larry Stark. Don continued his football career at John Carroll University, earning two letters for the Blue Streaks.
A lifelong Lorain resident, Don is married to his wife of more than 35 years, Juanita, and is the proud father three adult daughters: Samantha, Jessica and Erica.
Dave Rivera
Dave was a multi-sport athlete at Lorain Admiral King playing basketball and football. He found most of his success on the football field winning three letters for the Admirals.
Dave fell in love with radio while passing the time at work in his previous career. Dave later went to The Ohio Media School and graduated with a certificate in Radio Broadcasting in 2017. Dave had a strong social media presence with a particular interest in local high school sports. That presence brought Dave to the attention of the stations and in 2018 he joined WOBL, starting out as a sideline reporter.
Through the years he has become a valuable multiple tool contributor to the Sports Crew-filling in with Play by Play and Color Commentary duties as well as being a full time Marketing Specialist. Dave manages the social media presence of the station's sports coverage on Twitter and Facebook.
Dave is the play-by-play voice of the Lorain County 8 League during the basketball season. “My most memorable moment working for the station was broadcasting Midview in the Division 1 girls State Semifinals basketball game at the University of Dayton.”
Dave still lives in Lorain with his wife of over 20 years and two daughters.
Gary Tollett
I started as an intern with WOBL Radio in 2001 and left a few years later. In 2020 I returned as an Account Executive, later becoming the General Sales Manager. My wife, Renee’ and I purchased WOBL and WDLW in 2021.
Growing up as a kid I played baseball in Elyria playing for coaches such as Gene Lageza, the Brubaker family, Todd and Kevin, who truly made me love the competiveness of sports. I’ve called several things from youth baseball, stock car racing, high school basketball, parades and most recently youth boxing.
With all of that it’s the Friday Night lights experience that drives me back in the booth every week. Not only do I get to do play by play for high school football I get to sit alongside one of my best friends of several years, Brian DeVito. No matter what, the one thing I’ll always appreciate is our support local radio can provide to high school kids and the community. Gary and his wife Renee’ now reside in Sheffield Lake, their three children are grown leaving them empty nesters.
John Guzik
John was a multi-sport athlete at Southview and started in sports radio as a pre-teen reporting for the Jim Allen Sports Show.
He entered the radio business full-time after earning a Master’s Degree from Syracuse University in TV/Radio Management. He has over 30 years in TV and radio both on-air and in management including Operating Partner of a pair of stations in North Carolina. Away from the studio, he’s been involved in youth sports as a dad, coach, committee co-chair of the Avon Lake Youth Baseball Federation, and as a referee and umpire in sports ranging from Flag Football, to high school varsity basketball and men’s fastpitch softball and baseball.
He joined (rejoined?) the WOBL/WDLW sports team in 2019 and, after anchoring the inaugural year of Lorain County Sports Network's live coverage on YouTube, he's back alongside Don Vincent on WDLW for live high school football coverage this season. He lives in Avon Lake and has a son who is a recent graduate of The Ohio State University.
Brian Devito
Brian was a multi-sport athlete and class of 2017 Hall of Famer at Brookside High School. He still holds the Lorain County record for interceptions in a season with 10. He went on to play college football at Tiffin University. He enters his first year as color analyst alongside Play by Play Gary Tollet, with decades of knowledge and experience in sports. Away from the booth, Brian coaches his 2 sons in football, basketball and baseball and is one of the Directors in the Jr. Cards programs. He resides in Sheffield with his wife and 2 sons.
David Grendzynski
Dave Grendzynski’s career began in television. He worked as a producer in Augusta, Georgia, Columbus, Ohio, and Cleveland, Ohio.
After earning three Regional Emmy Awards in news, he won an Associated Press Award for his coverage of the 2007 American League Championship Series. He's also covered The Masters, an Ohio State National Championship game, was the host of his own sports talk radio show, and was in "The Q" when the Cleveland Cavaliers won the NBA title in 2016.
In addition to providing play-by-play for Ohio high school football regular season and playoff games, he is now a writer and content manager for KINEXON Sports, and hosts the "The Xtra Edge Podcast."
He lives in Lorain County with his wife, Adrianne, and their two boys, Tobin and Noah.
David Chopcinski
David Chopcinski was born and raised in Lorain, Ohio. He attended St. Stans and Nativity Catholic Schools, and graduated from Lorain Catholic in 1987. He then went on to the University of Toledo, where he earned two Associate degrees, one in Architectural Engineering and the other in Civil Engineering Science.
David’s love for photography started back in high school, but when he left for college, he stopped shooting photography. He rekindled his passion in 2015, joined a photography club a few years later and found his mentor. David reached out to Athletic Directors of several local schools and eventually started covering Amherst High School sports.
Over the pass 7 years, David has captured still photography for football, volleyball, basketball, softball, baseball and track for several local schools, but loves the athletes in the SWC, the most. He has also captured images thru credentials from two local internet media pages, NEOSI and currently Kee on Sports. Those credentials took him to the University of Toledo Football, Baldwin Wallace Football and Softball, the USFL (reg. Season, playoffs and Championship), the MAC Championship in Detroit at Ford Field, the Cleveland Monster, the Cleveland Charge, The Cleveland Guardians and The PBA (Pro Bowlers Association). He is also a licensed drone RPIC (remote pilot in command), that he acquired in August of 2022.
David’s full time job is a heavy highway construction surveyor for Kokosing, where he travels a lot for work and has slowed down his high school activity. So he has added Dramatic Sports Portraits to his style of photography, (lights, camera, FOG!) Which allows him to still shoot local athletes. He is also in the process of building his Real Estate Photography business.
Being born and raised in Lorain County, he now resides in Amherst Ohio, married to his wife Tricia. They have two kids, five grandkids and a couple of dogs. They enjoy hiking and walks and visiting family.
You can find samples of his images and reach out to him at his webpage, www.eciphotography.biz
Edwin Vereen
Edwin was a multisport athlete at North Myrtle Beach High (SC) playing Football, Track and Field, and Wrestling and Lettering in all three sports. Edwin was completing his studies at Ashford University where he graduated with a bachelor's degree in journalism and mass communications in 2019.
Edwin began his Sports Media career as a writer for Kee On Sports Media Group in 2021 as he covered High School football in Lorain County. Later that year Edwin joined WOBL WDLW Sports and began his on-air career doing color commentary for High School basketball.
In 2023 Vereen added another skill set when he became the LiveStream Video Producer for the Inaugural Season of the Lorain County Sports Network YouTube Channel during the 2023-24 HS Football and Basketball season.
Edwin is an avid podcaster, videographer, and a Mental Health Advocate. Edwin also likes to travel in his down time and hang out with friends and family.
Max Drummond
Max played football the majority of his life starting with youth football from age seven and participated through his senior year of high school at Tallmadge city schools.
While in high school he earned two varsity letters for football, and in his senior year was voted First-Team All-Conference at the center position.
Eventually, Max graduated from Heidelberg University with a bachelor’s degree in Sports Management, focusing on Communications. During his time at Heidelberg he served on gameday staff as well as production for a variety of the school’s sports, he also was a color analyst for all home football games for the Student Princes’ in the fall of 2022. At the same time he was able to complete a graduate program with the school securing his MBA.
Max conducted an internship with WOBL studios over the summer of 2022 and then went on to be a part of Friday night football broadcasts on WOBL through stat keeping and spotting. Max works in the Newsroom with WOBL & WDLW and spent his first full season in 2023 with WOBL WDLW Sports performing multiple roles on Friday nights for football broadcasts like play by play, color commentary, and live updates from stadiums in addition to stat keeping. This high school football season he will provide color commentary on one of the Lorain County Sports Network video live stream games on YouTube. Then on Saturday afternoons he will cover the future stars of Friday Night Lights, doing play by play for JR LC 8 football video live streaming on the Lorain County Sports Network YouTube channel as well.
David Q
After graduating from Southview High School in 1988 and later from The Ohio Center for Broadcasting, David began his radio career at WOBL in 1996 as a sports engineer. He also sharpened his on-air skills, quickly becoming “America’s most beloved radio personality” hosting weekend shows. In 2015, David moved into the studio and became a producer of both football and basketball broadcasts.
Maria Janasko
Maria was a multi-sport athlete at Lake Ridge Academy playing basketball and soccer. She was a letterman for 4-years with basketball and a 2-year letterman for soccer. Maria was a regional finalist and district champion as a junior at Lake Ridge Academy. She earned All-Ohio Honorable mention as a senior and All-County Honorable mentions as a junior and sophomore. She was also All-County Second Team as a freshman. As a junior at The College of Wooster she earned All-NCAC Honorable mention and NCAC Athlete of the Week after scoring a career high 29 points and having a game-high eight rebounds. Also during her junior year she was 5th in the conference in points, 2nd in rebound, and in the top 10 for blocks.
She graduated Wooster with a degree in Communications and now works for her family business as a licensed insurance agent.
Maria joined the WOBL/WDLW team as a color commentator for women’s basketball. She continues to be part of the basketball broadcast team as well as part of the studio crew for football.
Mz. Nikki
Nikki’s interest in sports started early - at the age of 5, she participated in gymnastics and ice skating. She grew up watching sports of all kinds with Grandpa Ron. They enjoyed watching all sports, from bowling and football to hockey and baseball. During her high school career at Olmsted Falls, Nikki served as a Basketball statistician and later became the first female Bulldog in school history, wearing the mascot uniform during her junior and senior years.
Nikki holds degrees in journalism and media broadcasting from the Ohio Center for Broadcasting and Cuyahoga Community College.
She started working at WOBL/WDLW in 2008 as a Sunday morning show host, and later transitioned into the midday show host between 2011 and 2016. Later, in 2016, she became the Traffic and A/R director including ad production, and in 2018 joined the Sports Crew working in studio doing the score updates, halftime and post-game shows. Now an empty nester, Nikki lives in Elyria with her husband Chuck.
Sam Sovacool
Sam was a graduate of Westlake High School and during his time attained three varsity letters and two captains honors on the men's track and field team. He ran the hurdles and was most successful running the 200m dash. After high school Sam eventually found his calling to radio. In 2021 he went to the Ohio Media School and that's how he found WOBL/WDLW. Sam interned in April of that year and eventually became a part of the crew at radio ranch.
Sam graduated from Ohio Media School August 2021 for a certificate in Radio & TV Broadcasting. He continues his education for a communication's degree.
Andy "Bull" Barch
Andy “Bull” Barch has been a play-by-play announcer, media professional and radio personality for the last 25 years and has been covering Lorain County High School sports since 2017. Bull joined the WOBL/WDLW sports team in January of 2024. He was the voice of the Lake Erie Crushers for 12 seasons (2011-2023).
Prior to his tenure with the Crushers, Barch served seven seasons in minor league baseball as a radio announcer, and director of media relations. Before he broke into baseball, Andy attended Bowling Green State University where he conducted several play-by-play broadcasts of BGSU athletics. He graduated from Bowling Green in 2003.
Bull made his debut in professional baseball in the Summer of 2003 with the Jamestown Jammers, a New York-Penn League (Short Season) affiliate of the Florida Marlins. He spent the following six seasons (2004-2009) with the West Virginia Power, a Class-A affiliate of the Pittsburgh Pirates (‘09), Milwaukee Brewers (‘05-08) and Toronto BlueJays (‘04) in the South Atlantic League. During his tenure as the “voice of the Power”, Andy called over 800 baseball games, including the 2009 South Atlantic League All-Star Game. He called two South Atlantic League Championship Series in 2007 and 2008. Barch also hosted a daily talk show titled “Bull on Baseball”. In 2009, Ballpark Digest named him the runner up for their Broadcaster of the Year Award.
In 2010, he came back to the Cleveland area where he was born and raised, to be the Director of Sports Information and radio voice of Notre Dame College Athletics in South Euclid, Ohio.
Bull left Notre Dame in 2017 to host an afternoon drive talk show on AM 930 WEOL in Elyria called “Bull’s Eye on the Afternoon.” In 2020, he represented the station at “Indians Radio Week” down in Goodyear, Arizona where he covered the Tribe for a week during spring training and called a Big League Spring Training Game with Jim Rosenhaus. In his tenure with the station he hosted many pregame talk shows at Rocket Mortgage Field House covering the Cleveland Cavaliers, and several pregame talk shows at Progressive Field Covering the Indians. While he no longer hosts the afternoon drive, he still works for the station covering high school football, basketball, baseball and softball games.
He resides in Avon, Ohio with his wife Kristen and son Will.
Jared Viancort
Jared grew up right here in Lorain County. Graduating from North Ridgeville High School in 2019 playing baseball and wrestled for the Rangers.
Jared went on to the University of Mount Union where he wrestled for the Purple Raiders and got a bachelor's degree both in Media and Spanish.
Whether Jared is doing something in English or Spanish, with a strong background in social media and interest in sports Jared fell in love with sports broadcasting because he loves bringing excitement and energy to the fans in any way possible.
He was part of RSM (Raider Student Media) where he broadcasted many different sports for the college and around the area for Mount Union's radio station 91.1 WRMU including Softball, Baseball, and Football. Also while at Mount Union Jared was an Intern for the USHL (United States Hockey League) Junior Hockey team the Youngstown Phantoms where they one their first Clark Cup in franchise history in May of 2023. After that Jared went to Ohio Media School where he got a sports degree.
He is also a wrestling coach for Bay Village High School.
Duke Antczak
Duke Antczak is a young-ish (how old is too old to be young?) media production professional. Duke has experience working with seasoned industry professionals in many leadership positions where he has led teams to a successful outcome. He has been working on building up my small video production company SLA Video Productions where we produce human interest stories primarily for older adults.
Duke is also the lead producer for the Akron City Football Club home games. During his career, he has produced major projects such as a documentary, a monthly talk show, a monthly cooking show, soccer games, basketball games, commercial productions, and many more interesting pieces. In his final two years of schooling in 2020 and 2021, he was captain of the speech and debate team, yearbook editor, Link Crew commissioner, bass drumline captain, producer, director, host, and radio personality. Duke is also a huge NASCAR fan.
Paul Williams
While writing was my main occupation with the Chronicle, Journal, Plain Dealer etc., I did do extensive radio work with ESPN 850, mainly covering the Cavs-Indians-Browns.
I know you guys already have pretty much any and all pieces needed to continue growing this amazing company, I just want to throw my name in that hat for ANYTHING that can help me grow with you, prove myself and just become a true asset to the team.
It's not my place as the newcomer but I also have so many ideas and plans that I have been working on independently that I hope, at some point, I can bring to the table.
Growing up in Lorain, going on to play sports through college and then joining the media/journal side of things as an adult, I've been blessed to gain unique and vast experience within this field and it's an honor and a dream of mine to continue growing, contributing and being a part of the sports scene in our area.
From covering little league sporting events to being in the Cavs locker room the entire 2016 year, getting exclusive interview with figures such as Kobe Byrant, I am comfortable in any setting within this industry.
Big John
Big John has been in radio for over 25 years. Big John is from Fraser, MI. He has kept his talent close to the lakes by working in Ohio at WOBL, WLKR and WCPZ along with working in Michigan at WSAQ. At WOBL,
Big John is an On-Air Personality, an in-house engineer, board-op producer. While attending Specs Howard School of Media Arts in Detroit, MI, Big John listened to Broadcaster Arthur Penthallow which became his mentor.