ESPN’s Beth Mowins Is About To Make NFL History In Denver

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Photo: Mowins 1 (AP)
In July, Beth Mowins watched the Denver Broncos run through drills at training camp in Englewood. She will become the first woman since 1987 to be the lead announcer on a nationally televised, regular season NFL game.

Interview Highlights With Beth Mowins:

On her historic debut:

"I have come to appreciate and embrace the significance of the moment, but honestly Ryan, I've worked hard my whole life to talk about sports, so that is the thing first and foremost on my mind -- the game. But I do understand that there are a lot of young people watching and a lot of women watching where, you know what? If I can give them something positive to look forward to, or encourage anybody out there who has a dream to go chase it, then that's great."

On getting the chance to call "Monday Night Football":

"I will always be grateful to the (Oakland) Raiders (Mowins has called their preseason games the last two years). They gave me a chance, and I've always thought that no matter what industry you're in, or how competitive it is, you don't need millions of people to get a job, you need one or two or a handful of people that think a little differently, that will ask a new question, and I'm forever grateful to the Raiders for not asking, 'Well, why should a woman do this?' They asked, 'Well, why not?'"

On the language she uses to describe the action on the field:

"I was an English major growing up and have always loved a catchy turn of phrase...I'm a big fan of alliteration, and while I don't prepare anything ahead of time, I do on occasion spend a moment with my head buried in a Thesaurus...I love finding more descriptive words if I can to describe a particular moment or a particular (play)...I do take a little bit of pride in trying to find on the fly, off the top of my head, the right way to describe the action...There are a lot of different ways just to describe a pass ... you can pass it, you can sling it, you can float it, you can rifle it...there's all different kinds of ways, I think, to describe a pass without getting too flowery, or getting too far away from the fact that a pass is still a pass."