Portage Northern Grad Named First PBP Announcer for A Men's Team

"I don't chase history. Sometimes history finds you" - Lisa Byington.

Portage Northern graduate Lisa Byington is a true trailblazer, being named this week as the first full time play-by-play announcer for a men's professional sport team. And that team is, the NBA champions, the Milwaukee Bucks.

While female play-by-play announcers are not unique anymore, being the main announcer for one team has not happened until now. Byington, a 1994 graduate of Portage Northern began achieving early, playing both basketball and soccer. And is no stranger to the big stage; her Northwestern basketball and soccer teams played in the NCAA Tournament. She got a journalism degree from the prestigious Northwestern Medill School of Journalism and then got a Masters Degree in Broadcast Journalism.

Byington brings to the job an impressive resume. This is not the first time she was the first female to call play-by-play, as in 2017, Byington became the first female play-by-play announcer to call a college football game for the Big Ten Network. She also called the 2019 Women's World Cup on Fox, and just called the postponed 2020 Olympics on NBC.

Byington credits her parents, when she was growing up, telling her to set goals. "not because this is what girls do, not because this is what the boys do, just set goals".

Byington told WOOD-TV's Jack Doles this new job and what it meant became real "and the world stopped", when she found Billie Jean King had tweeted her congratulations.

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