Knoxville Ice Bears

An Ice Bears one-two punch Saturday night

date: 01/09/2009

 

The Knoxville Ice Bears hope to deliver a few punches on Saturday night.

On Saturday night the SPHL champs want to deliver a knockout blow to the Twin City Cyclones and stay in first place as the race for the Cup gets more heated as the season moves on.

The second “punch” the team wishes to deliver is during Saturday’s Race Night promotion, sponsored by Lance Cunningham Ford and ESPN Radio, which features ESPN’s lead announcer for NASCAR, Dr. Jerry Punch who has been associated with ESPN since 1984.

Punch has served as host for ESPN2’s exclusive coverage of the Indy Pro Series and as a pit reporter for ESPN and ABC’s IndyCar Series coverage. He has also hosted SportsCenter at the Indy 500 coverage.

In the early ‘90s, Punch became the exclusive host of ESPN’s NASCAR Nationwide (formerly Busch) Series telecasts while serving as lead pit reporter and back-up play-by-play announcer on the NASCAR Cup Series events. In 2001, he became host of ESPN’s NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series coverage. Punch was part of the Emmy Award-winning broadcast crew covering the 1989 Indianapolis 500, and has served in that same capacity at Indy for 17 consecutive years.

Twice in 1988, his physician and broadcasting careers dramatically combined. In Bristol, Tenn., in August, Punch revived driver Rusty Wallace, who crashed in practice and was not breathing. Then in November in Atlanta, Punch joined the rescue effort to save Don Marmor who crashed in an ARCA race but survived.

Punch has been honored many times, including receiving the United States Air Force Outstanding Performance Award in 1989 for exemplary service in the auto racing community and NASCAR's 1990 Team Player of the Year Award.

Dr. Punch will here at the Ice Bears game to drop the puck and sign autographs in between periods. In addition, the players will be wearing specialty Race Night jerseys, which will be auctioned off immediately following the game. Fans can enter to win one of those jerseys at the game, compliments of Lance Cunningham Ford.

Visit www.knoxvilleicebears.com for more information.

Back