MEDIA BLITZ By John Molori

MEDIA BLITZ
By John Molori

Simply put, sports networks flock to the Super Bowl like Terrell Owens to a mirror. It’s all about hype, hysteria and hoopla. Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to Super Bowl Week, media style!

Zone defense

WWZN AM 1510 The Zone will have a strong Super Bowl presence in Houston. “The Eddie Andelman Show with Dave Jageler” (weekdays, Noon-3:00 p.m.) will be live from Radio Row Wednesday through Friday, with a special show on Saturday.

Andelman will do a special postgame show Sunday night after the Super Bowl from 10:00 p.m.-1:00 a.m. from WWZN’s Burlington studios.

“The Diehards” (weekdays, 3-7:00 p.m.) with Anthony Pepe, Ryen
Russillo, Mike Winn, and Kevin Winter will also be live from Houston Wednesday through Friday with a special show on Saturday.

Radio radar

Sportsradio 850 WEEI will have a major Houston onslaught all week long. “Dennis and Callahan” (weekdays, 6-10:00 a.m.), “Dale and Neumy” (weekdays, 10:00 a.m.-2:00 p.m.), and “The Big Show with Glenn Ordway” (weekdays, 2-6:00 p.m.) will all emanate live from Houston.

Ordway will also have a special edition “Big Show” following the Super Bowl on Sunday night. The usual Big Show suspects will be on hand including Pete Sheppard, whose WEEI contract is up on February 4.

“My new deal is being worked on right now,” says Sheppard. “It should be completed shortly and will be for at least two years, maybe more.”

WEEI is once again offering fans a chance to see the Patriots in the Super Bowl. A custom travel package has been created exclusively for WEEI by Target Sport Adventures.

The three-night deal from January 30-February 2 includes roundtrip airfare from Boston to Houston, hotel, one ticket to the NFL Experience and one ticket to the game.

It also includes an exclusive pregame party hosted by Sheppard and Jon Meterparel. For more information, log onto WEEI.com or targetsport.com.

Comcast cavalcade

CN8’s “Sports Pulse” hosted by Ed Berliner will also call Houston home this week. Reporter extraordinaire Phil Burton is in Houston starting Monday for live reports. Berliner will join him on Wednesday and Thursday.

“Right after the game is over on Sunday, we’ll be going live from Boston with studio guests, Phil Burton in Houston, and the NFL press conference feeds as soon as they happen,” says Berliner. “That one hour a night is huge for us and really shows what we can do.”

Fox fanfare

Fox Sports Net (FSN) has unprecedented local and network coverage from Houston, including live Super Bowl editions of “Mohegan Sun New England Sports Tonight” (NEST) at 6:30 p.m. and 10:00 p.m. all week.

Greg Dickerson will cohost NEST from Houston beginning on Monday and will be joined by Gary Tanguay on Wednesday. Throughout the week, NEST coverage will feature local and national football media experts and celebrity guests.

FSN will telecast from the NFL stage overlooking Reliant Stadium in Houston. On Wednesday and Friday, the “Celtics’ Halftime” show will feature a live update from Houston.

“New England Tailgate,” hosted by Glenn Ordway will air from Houston on Thursday at 7:00 p.m.

Immediately following the completion of the Patriots-Panthers contest on Sunday at approximately 10:00 p.m., FSN will have live post-game coverage including interviews with Patriots players and coaches.

The network has also joined with “Sam Adams” beer for a special “Boston ‘D’ Party” at Brian O’Neill’s Restaurant and Irish Pub in Houston. Tanguay, Dickerson, Sam Adams founder Jim Koch and other local celebrities will be at O’Neill’s on Saturday from 4-7:00 p.m.

All proceeds from the event and a silent auction will be donated to the Boys & Girls Club in the name of Patriots star Richard Seymour, a regular on NEST and supporter of the Club.

Admission to the event is $20.00 and includes food, drink and prizes. Auction items include an autographed Seymour jersey and Patriots mini-helmet, and autographed Celtics, Bruins and Red Sox items

Eye on Houston

CBS Sports culminates its coverage of the 2003 NFL season with the Patriots and Panthers in Super Bowl XXXVIII at 6:25 p.m. It will be the network’s 15th Super Bowl broadcast.

Greg Gumbel and Phil Simms will call the play-by-play and analysis respectively. They will be joined on the sidelines by reporters Armen Keteyian and Bonnie Bernstein.

“The Super Bowl Today” begins on CBS at 2:00 p.m. with host Jim Nantz, analysts Dan Marino, Deion Sanders and Boomer Esiason and reporters Marcus Allen, Lesley Visser and Dick Enberg.

Esiason has a full day of multimedia Super Bowl work. After his CBS pregame gig with Nantz and company, he’ll head upstairs and join play-by-play announcer Marv Albert, and reporters John Dockery and John Riggins to call the game on radio for CBS/Westwood One.

CBS Super Bowl coverage leading into the 2:00 p.m. pregame show caters to young and old alike. At 11:00 a.m., it’s “Nickelodeon Takes Over the Super Bowl,” an hour of football, music, games, NFL players and, of course, plenty of Nick’s signature green slime.

Once the kiddies have had their fun, teenagers are served up a helping of “MTV’s TRL at the Super Bowl.” Host Carson Daly will feature guest appearances by top musical artists and NFL players.

At 1:00 p.m., old-timers get their due with “Phil Simms’ All-Iron Team-Old School Edition.” Simms and Gumbel select 12 players and one coach who best represent the qualities of Iron Men.

As always, CBS is planning some interesting technical wrinkles for Super Bowl XXXVIII. EyeVision will allow fans to see the replay of a particular play from a multitude of different angles.

For the first time on a Super Bowl broadcast, the pregame show, the game, halftime and postgame show will be presented in HDTV.

Another Super Bowl-first is CableCam, a suspended camera flying on a cable that can go up to 20 mph, giving viewers the ability to feel the action by following the play from an angle behind the offense.

CBS estimates a Super Bowl audience of 130 million viewers in the United States and a potential worldwide audience of 800 million viewers.

Bristol bombardment

ESPN is providing daily multimedia coverage leading into Sunday’s Pats-Panthers tilt.

Programming began Sunday with the 10:30 a.m. “SportsCenter” and will climax on Sunday with a three-hour “Sunday NFL Countdown” at 11:00 a.m., “NFL PrimeTime” at 10:30 p.m., and SportsCenter at 11:00 p.m.

Other ESPN programming includes “NFL Live” on ESPN2 from Houston, all week long at 7:00 p.m., “NFL Match-Up” on Sunday at 8:30 a.m., “Sports Reporters” on Sunday at 10:00 a.m. and “Cold Pizza” all week long from Houston at 7:00 a.m.

ESPN Classic’s Houston Road Show airs at 4:00 p.m. on Saturday. Guests include past Super Bowl standouts Ronnie Lott, Harry Carson and Desmond Howard.

ESPN Classic will also feature Super Bowl highlights on Thursday and Friday from 1-8:00 p.m., and SportsCentury blocks on Saturday, 9:00 a.m.- 4:00 p.m. and 6-11:00 p.m.

ESPNEWS is running daily morning press conferences all week long with Commissioner Paul Tagliabue slated for Friday at 12:30 p.m. As always, ESPN.com features breaking news and features from Len Pasquarelli, John Clayton, Joe Theismann and Bill Simmons.

Network news

The recently debuted NFL Network is licking its collective chops at the prospects of its first Super Bowl. In addition to regularly scheduled programming, the network will re-air the commercials from Super Bowl XXXVIII at 11:00 p.m. on Super Bowl Sunday and repeat them the next day at 9:30 p.m.

“NFL Total Access” is broadcasting live from Houston all week long. Joining host Rich Eisen are Terrell Davis, Sterling Sharpe, Seth Joyner and reporters Kara Henderson, Warren Sapp and Jerome Bettis.

Live coverage of Bill Belichick’s press conference is on Friday at 9:30 a.m. followed immediately by Panthers coach John Fox at 10:30 a.m. On Saturday, the network has live coverage of the Hall of Fame press conference where the 2004 inductees will be announced.

On February 4 at 9:00 p.m., fans can relive Super Bowl XXXVIII with a 60-minute condensed version of the big game in High Definition on “Game of the Week: Super Bowl XXXVIII.” NFL Network is carried on DIRECTV’s basic service.

John Molori’s Media Blitz column is published in The Boston Metro, The Providence Journal, The Lawrence Eagle-Tribune, The Lowell Sun, Patriots Football Weekly, BostonSportsMedia.com and MethuenOnline.com. John can be reached via E-mail at JOMOL3@aol.com.