Golden Knights, Lotus Broadcasting happy with partnership

By Steve Carp Las Vegas Review-Journal

8 years ago

General manager of Lotus Broadcasting Tony Bonnici, left, and Vegas Knights president Kerry Bubolz at the broadcasting station in Las Vegas, Wednesday, April 12, 2017. (Elizabeth Brumley Las Vegas Review-Journal) @EliPagePhoto

General manager of Lotus Broadcasting Tony Bonnici, left, and Golden Knights president Kerry Bubolz at the broadcasting station in Las Vegas, Wednesday, April 12, 2017. (Elizabeth Brumley Las Vegas Review-Journal @EliPagePhoto

Review-Journal columnist Ed Graney, left, and co-host Seat Williams, talk to Golden Knights owner Bill Foley Wednesday about the team’s broadcast deal with Lotus Broadcasting at the station in Las Vegas, Wednesday, April 12, 2017. (Elizabeth Brumley Las Vegas Review-Journal) @EliPagePhoto

Like any marriage, the Golden Knights and Lotus Broadcasting had to make sure they were good for each other before tying the knot.

As Lotus general manager Tony Bonnici said, “Our biggest concern was would it be a ‘win-win’ or would it be a one-sided deal? If it was a one-way deal, we weren’t interested.”

After almost four months of negotiations, the sides announced Wednesday a three-year partnership that will have:

— All Golden Knights games broadcast on the Fox Sports Radio affiliates (KRLV 1340 AM and KLAV 98.9 FM).

— A half-hour pregame show.

— A one-hour call-in postgame show.

— A weekly one-hour talk show.

— All games will be streamed live on the internet.

— A game of the week broadcast in Spanish on KENO-AM (1460).

Financial terms of the deal were not made public.

“The bottom line is for our listeners, they’ll be able to follow the Golden Knights all season long without interruption,” Bonnici said. “Whether it’s AM, FM, streaming, in Spanish. If you want it, it’s there.”

Knights president Kerry Bubolz said it was important to do business with a local partner that also understands sports.

“The most important part is we have a great partner who understands what we do and has the same vision we have,” Bubolz said. “We also have a tremendous promotional partner who will help us get the word out. We’re in a nontraditional hockey marketplace, and they are by far the best to help us with year-round coverage of the Vegas Golden Knights.”

Bubolz said the next step is to find the broadcast teams for English and Spanish.

“We’ll start that process shortly,” he said. “We want to hire the best talent. But that person has to be a personality that fits on our hockey side as well as business. If he’s not a good fit on the hockey side, he’s probably not the right person.”

Follow all of our Golden Knights coverage online at reviewjournal.com/GoldenKnights and @HockeyInVegas on Twitter.

Contact Steve Carp at scarp@reviewjournal.com or 702-387-2913. Follow @stevecarprj on Twitter.