“If you don’t like that, you don’t like Salesianum basketball!” These words, spoken when Zach Welsh scored the first points of his career, became infamous in Sallies lore, featured in the Spirit Week video and being the talk of the town for quite some time. These words, as well as other highlights and clips of the ‘19-‘20 Sallies basketball team, came from one group bringing Sallies games to your home: WSAL. 

This year, WSAL is expanding far beyond what was once possible and improving upon the success they have achieved within our community. Taking their call letters from the former homeroom show, WSAL sought to revive the broadcasting program at Sallies that has ties to the 1950s, when Sallies was one of the first secondary schools with their own television program used for in-class instruction.

WSAL relaunched in December 2019 at the Silent Night game and quickly grew from a production with students learning on the fly to a well-oiled machine as the basketball season progressed.

The team produced seven live games, all at the Birk, and were finally able to bring the thrill of high school sports to the comfort of viewers’ homes. Although this was a great start to the program, the team was looking to improve on the solid foundation and really take their streams to the next level.

This year, the introduction of Abessinio Memorial Stadium has the crew of WSAL excited about new possibilities, especially with the TV studio in the stadium. The stadium will allow WSAL to control the feed of the game and broadcast highlights, graphics, and other videos to the scoreboard in real time. These capabilities, and many other new features, will help the group broadcast countless events, including masses, skits, the fall play, Incident at Vichy, and many others, to an audience that may not have been able to experience them due to the pandemic, which would have been nearly impossible at this time last year. 

Aidan Keener ‘21, Student Director of WSAL, is optimistic about the trajectory of the program this year. “I’m really excited to face the challenges this pandemic brings us and to allow our Salesianum community, whether it’s students, parents, alumni, etc, unprecedented access to our student athletes despite social distancing. We are going to combine an authentic Salesianum experience with a stream on par with college or even professional broadcasting.”

So look out, Salesianum, because just when you thought you’d be missing out on the restart of sports, WSAL has your back. Stay tuned for what’s to come by visiting vimeo.com/wsal, and be sure to check out all the upcoming games, Masses, and the fall production of Incident at Vichy.