Inside the Press Box: Steve Kolbe

Storming the Crease is conducting a series of interviews with people who cover (or work for) the Caps and the NHL. You can find a link to the series archives on the right sidebar. Today's eighth installment: Caps Radio Play-By-Play Voice Steve Kolbe.

1. Describe your game-day preparations, including the extra features for the Caps Web site.

Well the Web site is just a small extra piece; it only comes out once a week. It's our Take Five segment but that really doesn't take up the bulk of what I go through during the course of a week to get ready for a game. Right now, we're just getting done this game against the Islanders [on Dec. 4]; we're already looking ahead to the Toronto Maple Leafs and Carolina Hurricanes.

Sometimes, I don't think people realize that, for every hour of on-air work that you do, there's probably six to eight hours of preparation time ahead of that. We've got to go through not only our own team but trends and streaks -- good or bad -- for the opponents, storylines on a particular player. For instance, against the Islanders, they had a lot of injuries -- they got Mike Sillinger back. You've got storylines of Billy Guerin and Doug Weight approaching 1,000 points. So it's a lot of stuff done late at night and the wee hours of the morning until about 3:00 in the morning and then back up at 8:00 or 8:30 on a game day and then it doesn't end until 10:00 at night.

It's a process. I try to have sketches five games ahead and then you focus on the game-at-hand when that comes up. So it's a lot of work behind the scenes that people usually don't get a chance to see.

2. What's the difference between broadcasting solo and having Ken Sabourin in the booth with you?

For the first, I don't have the exact number, but I'd say nearly 500 NHL games that I did solo. Having Ken in the booth at home adds an element of having a guy who was there and [went] through those situations, where he can say this is what just happened and why it happened. So we get a chance to have some fun and bounce stuff off of each other.

Like tonight, the game was 2-2 through two periods and it was a wild one going down the stretch. And, when we finally do score that game-winning goal, we were just talking about that a couple of minutes before as to how the Capitals were crashing the net. And Ken was able to point out that, if the Capitals kept getting shots from the point and went to the net, they were finally going to crack that goaltender and that's what happened.

3. The NHL Network's "Voices" was here taping you on Nov. 10 against the Tampa Bay Lightning. Can you talk a little bit about that experience?

Great experience. I was telling Ken about that and I said 'you know, they've done the greats. They've done Joe Bowen and Rick Jeanneret and Peter Maher out in Calgary.' They were making their rounds around the NHL so I'm pretty honored they decided to come down and follow me around for the day. We had a chance to go into what we do for the game. They came out to the house and I got a chance to show them all the high drama that it takes to prepare for that night's game. It was pretty interesting.

We had a great game to do. The Capitals scored three quick ones on a good friend, Olie Kolzig, and Tampa Bay. It got off to a good start. I'm waiting to see, and I know that just put the finishing touches on that yesterday or today in terms of the editing. So that one is put to bed, so to speak, and now we just wait for it to come out. It's number 10 in the series. So I'm not sure if that's going to be the second or third week of December, but I know it's on the horizon. So that was a lot of fun.

(Editor's Note: The episode will debut next Thursday, Dec. 11.)

4. It's probably hard after all these years to pinpoint one hockey moment that sticks out but can you talk about your favorite moments?

Obviously my first game was one of my favorite moments [at] Toronto's Maple Leaf Gardens. I probably got about an hour's worth of sleep before that game between the phone calls late at night and just staring at the ceiling wondering if I was going to belong. If I was going to be able to do this at this level -- where everyone who is in our business is striving to get to -- and, with so many famous players then and broadcasters that went through Toronto's Maple Leaf Gardens, to be able to get there. I think that stands out.

The first game of the Stanley Cup Finals obviously is going to stand out for anybody. I'm sure it's like the first game of the World Series or NBA Finals or the Super Bowl, if you get a chance to broadcast that.

And the series-clincher against the Buffalo Sabres is one that's always going to be on the top of the list as well because it was the first time this franchise that I grew up a fan of as a kid in Baltimore -- it was the first time they were able to get past that threshold and make it all the way to the finals.

So I think those three are perhaps my three stars of games remembered.

5. Lastly, when you're not diving into highlights and you're not spending day and night talking about the Caps, what do you do for fun to take your mind off of things during the summer?

During the season, it's hockey 24-7 from the month of August, early September when we hit training camp, it's nothing but hockey. When a game ends, you start looking ahead to the next game. With three games in four nights and four in six, you know it's hockey all the time.

In the summer, bass fishing is a passion of mine. It's what I like to do. I've had a chance to fish in a lot of competitive bass tournaments and I did fairly well this past summer. So it's what I like to do in the summer in terms of picking up the rod and reel, getting on the Potomac River and just having some fun floating around for hours at a time and catching some fish. So that's what I do in the off-season. It's a pretty good way to spend a day even if you don't catch anything.

We go so hard during the season. For eight months a year, we just put our heads down and blast ahead. Hopefully, we're doing as entertaining a broadcast as we can. And I don't do it by myself. Obviously, I've got Ken. We've got engineers up there, we've got studio guys and Jonathan Warner and producers like Steve Rayback inside the studio who lend a hand on all this as well. So it's not just me, I'm just the point man in this whole thing.

And it's what I love to do. I could talk about hockey from the moment I wake up to the moment I hit the rack at night. I'm glad to be at this level and now, unlike what I thought during the first game at Toronto's Maple Leaf Gardens, now I know I belong. So 800-plus games later, approaching 900 games this season hopefully to 1,000 next year, now you don't have the question mark of whether or not you belong at this level any more. Now you know you belong.

The rest of the guys around the league, I think I've earned their respect. You don't just get respect right out of the gate, you've got to earn it by the way you conduct yourself and the way you work and hopefully we've gotten there.