ESPN personality Matt Barrie primed for sweet return to Fargo to feature Bison football

• 
• 
• 
• 
• 

FARGO -- In a previous trip to Fargo, ESPN's Matt Barrie wore a furry Bison hat and feasted on a Bison burger in the Fargodome. Barrie is slated to a adorn a beekeeping suit in a return trip.

"This will, in fact, be the first time I've been in a bee suit in my entire life," Barrie said Friday afternoon.

North Dakota State football is set to be featured Monday, Aug. 11, for ESPN's "SportsCenter: 50 States in 50 Days" nationwide summer tour. Barrie will anchor the coverage from Fargo for the primary edition hour-long sports news show that starts at 1 p.m. (CDT) on ESPN.

Barrie is slated to do multiple live shots that include Bison head football coach Tim Polasek, along with other pre-produced local area stories during the hour.

"The goal of this show in the hour is to have something North Dakota featured in every block of the show," Barrie said.

A trip to an area honey company is one of the planned segments, Barrie said. North Dakota is the top honey-producing state in the United States, with neighboring Minnesota also ranked in the top seven.

"I'm going to be doing something in a bee suit," Barrie said. "I'm going to do some fun stuff there."

Barrie also had fun in his previous trip to Fargo for ESPN. In October of 2015, Barrie was on site for ESPN's "SportsCenter on the Road" that originated from the Fargodome. ESPN personalities Sara Walsh and Marty Smith also joined Barrie for that live show.

At the time, Chris Klieman was NDSU's head football coach. Klieman is now the head coach at Kansas State.

"It was one of my favorite 'SportsCenter on the Road' stops," Barrie said. "It's just a place that they're so passionate about their school and about the football team and about the area. ... It was such a fun atmosphere."

NDSU also hosted ESPN's "College GameDay," the network's popular football preview show, in 2013 and 2014. Both of those shows originated from downtown Fargo near the iconic Fargo Theatre sign. Unlike those previous three ESPN stops, Monday's show is not open to the public, said NDSU athletic director Matt Larsen.

The Bison have won 10 Division I FCS national championships since the 2011 season.

The "50 States in 50 Days" tour started on June 27 with ESPN's Scott Van Pelt in Washington, D.C. The seven-week-long tour's final show scheduled for Aug. 16 at the Little League World Series in Williamsport, Pennsylvania.

Barrie said "best-of" segments from Monday's primary show will also be aired again on later "SportsCenter" shows throughout Monday.

For Barrie, the Fargo stop is his third of the four he's scheduled to anchor on the tour. On July 31, Barrie was at Ohio State football training camp as part of the Ohio stop. The Buckeyes are the defending NCAA Division I FBS national champion, while the Bison are the defending FCS champions.

"When they told me for the 'SportsCenter 50 States in 50 Days' that I was going to do both (football) national champions, Ohio State and North Dakota State, I was excited to go back to Fargo because I really, really enjoyed my time there," Barrie said.

Barrie said this summer SportsCenter tour has served as a vehicle to feature unique stories and places outside of the larger national storylines.

"The goal of this was to showcase places that don't always get national attention," Barrie said. "It's ESPN, the worldwide leader, so we understand that the bigger sports franchises, the bigger schools the bigger teams are going to get the attention ... but this was an opportunity to get out and showcase other people, places and things that don't normally get that."

Even if that falls outside the scope of traditional sports coverage -- like wearing a bee suit.

"I work at a place where one day I was walking out of the bathroom five Stormtroopers walked by me so you never know what's going to happen at ESPN," Barrie said. "We'll do anything that showcases the event we're covering."