St. Louis Radio: Brooke Grimsley Joins Opening Drive On 101.1 FM

It’s March Madness time, and appropriately for the peak of the college basketball season sportscaster Brooke Grimsley is playing the transition game, according to stltoday.com.

She’s in a career transformation, moving from television to radio as she is leaving KMOV (Channel 4), most recently in the lead sports role, to co-host the popular “Opening Drive” show that airs from 7-10 a.m. weekdays on sports-talker WXOS 101.1 FM.

Grimsley wrapped up her full-time television duties last week, though she will continue to appear occasionally through March 29, and on Monday started her first full-time week on 101. She is teamed with Randy Karraker and Carey Davis. But Karraker has been off this week and will be gone for jury duty at the beginning of next week, so Grimsley hasn’t been able to fully start settling in to her new role. And given that she still has a few TV responsibilities left, this month for her really is as full of twists and turns similar to what basketball tournaments can have.

Easing the transition is that she has done fill-in work on 101 in recent months, and said radio is her first broadcasting love. So returning to that branch of the media, on which her career began in her native Tennessee, is appealing to her.

“This is a once-in-a-lifetime situation,” she said. “I’ve always loved radio. ... It always has been a goal, more of a dream, of mine to get back into radio. It’s so much fun, it’s an absolute blast.”

A three-hour radio show certainly provides much more opportunity to expound than does than the typical two-minute sports segment that airs on KMOV — which does not have a sports report in its typical 5 p.m. newscasts.

“That’s nothing against Channel 4 or TV in general, it’s just the way it is,” she said. “With radio you’re able to show more of your sports knowledge, go more in depth and have fun and show people more of your personality.”