Courtesy St. Louis Post Dispatch

(April 3, 2009) It's been more than a decade since Trey Wingo left St. Louis to take a shot at hitting the jackpot at ESPN, and he heads back to town this weekend having long ago cashed his ticket.

He'll be host of the network's coverage of the women's Final Four, which takes place Sunday and Tuesday at Scottrade Center.

Wingo was a popular sportscaster at KSDK (Channel 5) for six years before leaving in 1997 for a job at ESPNEWS, which at the time was an upstart component of the ESPN empire and served as a proving ground for some aspiring for "SportsCenter.''

"I hope I don't have to be a towel boy too long," he said at the time he was hired for ESPNEWS.

He quit delivering towels long ago, and in his 11 1/2 years at ESPN he has had a multitude of roles, including hosting "SportsCenter.''

"I think the only show I never did was 'RPM Tonight,'" he said, chuckling, this week. "ESPN continues to grow and they have so many possibilities to do things, if you're around long enough you'll probably get your hand on just about everything.''

Wingo, 45, has a dry humor and a quick wit, attributes that long have been favored by those doing the hiring at ESPN.

Al Jaffe, who was a key ESPN recruiter when Wingo was hired, once said he "really was impressed with the first tape I saw (of Wingo), his delivery, energy, his good wit ... (his) sports knowledge. I thought he would energize well with us."

FOOTBALL FEST

He had a twofold reason to move to ESPN, which is based in Bristol, Conn. — not only a chance for national prominence, but the opportunity to return to the home state of Wingo and his wife.

And Wingo has carved out a spot as one of the network's primary football anchors. He is heavily involved in coverage of the NFL draft and is the lead host of "NFL Live,'' the network's only year-round show dedicated to a specific sport.

And he said there never is a lack of material to discuss, pointing to major offseason stories this week such as the Jay Cutler saga and Michael Vick's bankruptcy proceedings and Donte Stallworth's arrest.

"There's never a day when we walk in and say, 'What are we going to talk about?''' he said. "If the NFL was introduced to American society now, the government would regulate it as a controlled substance. It's that addictive. And the interest never goes away.''

But while football is his favorite sport, he'll be talking about women's college basketball for the next few days — as he has been doing throughout the tournament.

He's in his fourth year of hosting ESPN's coverage of the event, something he was doing before "NFL Live'' went year-round. And he said it still serves as a nice change of pace for him between the Super Bowl and the draft.

"If (the tourney) went later in the year, it would be very difficult for me to do it,'' Wingo said. "But it falls into this perfect little window for me.''

LOCAL LINE

In an interesting twist, when Wingo was hired by KSDK he beat out two men for the job who now are mainstays locally — Bob Ramsey, the longtime voice of St. Louis University basketball and veteran of many sports-talk radio stations, and Frank Cusumano, who was working in Kentucky but not long after was hired at 5.

So Wingo, who had been working in Allentown, Pa., joined Malcolm Briggs to work under sports director Mike Bush (who since has moved to KSDK's lead male news anchor).

"When I got there, I thought I was a pretty good writer and had an OK presentation on the air,'' Wingo said. "But I didn't know anything about how to cultivate a story or do some digging. Working with Mike was a godsend for me. That guy knew how to work it, he knew how to get stories and keep peoples' interest. The same story that would be presented on all three stations, he'd find a way to make it creative or different.

"It's hard for me to realize I've been at ESPN twice as long as I was at 5, because I still think of those six years as such a large part of my life. Both my kids were born in St, Louis, so it's always going to be a second hometown to us.''

But he's glad to be at ESPN.

"It's really been great, I couldn't be happier about the way things turned out and what I've done,'' he said. "I don't want it to sound like a cliché, but really it couldn't have gone much better.''