Photo Courtesy of @samsmithonyt on Instagram
Sam Smith is a sports broadcasting major at Dean College. In his free time, Smith broadcasts Boston Bruins games mostly in his dorm or back home in New Hampshire. This is his fourth season broadcasting games on YouTube. Smith stated what he loves about the streams, “It's the fun interactions with the chat, I think that people really started to pick up on the idea, especially in the past year or so. Yeah, the broadcasting is great, but also talking to fellow hockey fans is also really cool” Smith continued saying that he loves having his own platform. “I've become that voice for people who don’t really have that," Smith said.
Smith fell in love with the Boston Bruins when he was much younger. “I remember my dad turning on the TV one day and the Bruins were on, and I was hooked, and I remember being attracted to the team. I was just really hooked on hockey, and I wanted to learn more about it, and I'm still into it all these years later.”
Photo courtesy Sam Smith
In 2021, Smith started his YouTube Channel “Sam Smith”. “I was like, I am bored what do I do? I was just doing schoolwork, and I was thinking to myself, I want something else to do. I want something to look forward to during my days. Alright, let’s start a YouTube channel and see where this takes me," Smith continued.
Smith explained how he thought about calling Bruins games himself because he was sick of the Bruins commentary. “Maybe I just listen to myself instead, and it evolved from there”.
Smith named Jack Edwards, Gary Thorne, and Mike “Doc” Emrick as broadcasters he looked up to when he was younger. What he likes about Doc is the way he can tell stories. “Doc is easily I think the greatest hockey announcer that ever lived, the way he tells stories about the game is insane and I like to say that I am a professional storyteller about the game. Doc kind of helped that out for me.”
Smith's YouTube channel has a loyal following of over 1.5K subscribers/ “I knew it would happen eventually; I didn't know it would happen now. We hit 1,000 last season, and I was like, my goal is fifteen hundred by the end of next season, and we hit with two months to go in the season. It's kind of insane to just see the evolution of my channel growing," Smith explained.
Photo Courtesy Harrison Soep
Although he has a loyal following on YouTube, Smith notes that school broadcasts and work come first. “I make sure my schedule is set every day so that I can set aside time so I can do schoolwork, work with my YouTube schedule, and also work with my Dean schedule,” Smith said.
Smith also notes there are plenty of major differences between broadcasting on YouTube and at Dean. For Dean, Smith said “For Dean’s broadcasting, the way I prepare for it is way more than what I do for YouTube stream because it's a little more casual. For Dean, I get boards such as roster sheets and getting stats.”
As for his YouTube broadcasts, Smith says, “Let me make sure my graphics are right, my scoreboard, my goal horn graphics, my intro is ready to go, let me make sure I have the right rosters."
Another key difference was the presentation between both sides. “The eyes are on you because I can’t show the game the eyes aren’t on me when I call a dean game but on YouTube, the eyes are on you," Smith explained.