For the second straight year, KDKA+ and JRM Media are providing live coverage and producing one Presidents’ Athletic Conference football game per week. However, this content coverage all began when a former Waynesburg University student pitched the idea. 

“Austin Bechtold, a Waynesburg University graduate, inquired with KDKA about something similar,” PAC Commissioner Joe Onderko said. “So really he and them deserve all the credit here. [JRM Sports] They’re the ones who made the contact, the ones who do the production and handle everything.”

Onderko said the PAC as a whole has no impact on what games are picked to cover, nor any influence or pull in how the production is done. 

“Keep in mind, schools themselves own their rights of the broadcast for their content,” 

Onderko said. “Schools have the rights to do what they will with the rights to their games.”

Onderko said this all started a few years prior when WKBN, a CBS affiliate out of Ohio, began to stream games primarily for Thiel College, Westminster College and Grove City College. 

Despite not having direct involvement, Onderko believes this is a great benefit for the conference in more than one way. 

“The production that Austin and his group have put together is very high quality,” he said. “So I think people not only are getting exposed to PAC football for the first time, but are seeing a very high quality broadcast and professional announcers and seeing things done at a very high level.” 

Bechtold, while appreciative of the praise, believes the credit of this idea belongs to Jake Mysliwczyk and JRM Media, the company Bechtold works for. 

“It is important for me being the face of it where I get more of the credit, but really a lot of the credit should go to Jake because a lot of this stems from the relationship Jake and JRM has with KDKA and KDKA+,” he said. 

When JRM and Bechtold began covering PAC football, it was strictly with Washington & Jefferson College in 2021. At the start of 2022, Allegheny College joined the conference and halfway through that season, Geneva College signed with JRM as well. 

“We did W&J streams for a couple of years, including all of their home games for two years, and then it was transformed to TV,” Bechtold said. “ They [Allegheny] were coming into the PAC and wanted to be a part of it. We also had an extra week at the end of the year, so we did a W&J vs Geneva game.” 

Bechtold met Mysliwczyk from another former Waynesburg student, Jack Hilgrove when announcing for Baldwin High School during the COVID season in 2020. Bechtold elaborated how he has nothing but “respect and appreciation” for the relationship he and Mysliwczyk have. 

“Jake has been great for me, he has been loyal to me as well. Jake and I have a really good relationship,” Bechtold said. “We communicate a lot, whether it be basketball, football, we have a hockey contract and do PIHL hockey, so he’s been awesome in the way for him to grow his company.” 

For Mysliwczyk, he, along with Ryan Milan helped create JRM Sports in 2016 with Baldwin’s TV studio get its real start in 2020 for Baldwin football. Mysliwczyk says that he never foresaw this takeoff happening. 

“John Saras, the athletic director at the time, called us to come broadcast the games since people couldn’t attend in person,” Mysliwczyk said. “ We started as a sports broadcasting/video production group, but we did not expect in four years to be working with the Steelers and college football, it’s crazy.”

Mysliwczyk said that with KDKA there is no contract, rather a year-to-year agreement. 

“Right now, it is a year-by-year type thing, I’m not even sure what the future looks like for next year,” he said. 

Mysliwczyk also said despite the optimism regarding KDKA, he is always open to expanding to cover other PAC sports. 

“We talked about playing basketball for W&J, but the interest doesn’t seem to be there,” Mysliwczyk said. “We would possibly like to expand to basketball, baseball, even softball coverage.” 

So what started as just a little media company providing live football coverage on the PAC Digital Network for two conference schools is now on the televisions of many on KDKA+ for half of the conference as JRM Media and Bechtold continue to grow their brand. 

Below is the remaining schedule for all the games KDKA+ & JRM Sports will be broadcasting this season: 

• Sept. 21 Thiel vs Geneva 7:00 P.M
• Sept. W&J vs Carnegie Mellon 2:00 P.M
• Oct. 12 Grove City vs Carnegie Mellon 2:00 P.M
• Oct. 19 W&J vs Grove City 6:00 P.M
• Oct. 26 Allegheny vs Waynesburg 4:00 P.M
• Nov. 9 Geneva vs Westminster  1:00 P.M
• Nov. 16 Allegheny vs W&J 1:00 P.M