There’s nothing quite like Too Live U. The entire athletic program continues to thrive thanks to elite play from our student-athletes and leadership from coaches and administration, but an unsung piece of the puzzle to this success comes from the consistency and creativity of the sports information and marketing team.

Bryce Hayes, SID Director, and Nick Trumble, Assistant SID Director, have done a phenomenal job of elevating TLU Athletics as a brand. For those that have read my work, last year I sat down with Bryce and learned about his journey and now this year I’m running it back but this time with Nick.

Since graduating from here in 2022, Nick has been working alongside Bryce doing everything from content creation on the socials, commentating live on air, setting up all the tech for the live streams, etc. I sat down with Nick earlier this week to unpack his journey and unique connections to TLU, all while shining light on the great things the SID team has done to continuously promote TLU and DIII athletics to the highest of standards.

With all this being said, Nick has actually been a part of the TLU athletics family long before this new era of the department took off, as I first wanted to get to know his background.

“Growing up I was a military kid and I moved around a lot. I lived in North Carolina, Washington (state), Texas, and I was actually born in Germany, but one thing that was always the same was my passion for sports. I played every sport there was growing up: soccer, football, baseball, basketball, and even track and cross country.”

– Nick Trumble

As Nick went into high school while living in Washington, he had aspirations of playing college sports and began focusing more and more on basketball. During that time, he had battled numerous injuries throughout his high school career but still was able to make his goals a reality by playing his college ball at TLU.

“So, my grandparents live 30 minutes down the road from TLU and I thought it was a great opportunity to continue my education, while still playing basketball. My grandpa also knew Coach Wacker (former TLU and Judson HS Men’s Basketball Coach) from nearby Judson High School and I ended being able to play here.”

– Nick Trumble

Nick would go on to play for a year and a half at TLU and was a part of the 2018-19 team that was the regular season and conference tournament champions of the SCAC. While on the team, Nick also expanded his horizons by joining the Omega Tau fraternity on campus during his freshman year and eventually became the active President.

“That time period shifted me as a person. Joining that fraternity, you know a lot of people were telling me ‘that’s stupid, that’s stupid’, but I think it made me a better person just because I was always trying to be that cool guy only hanging with the athletes. I was very close minded at the time, to put it that way, but once I joined the fraternity it kind of moved me away from basketball. Sometimes I regret it, but I knew I didn’t want to play basketball after college so it was either ‘Do I want to play here three more years?’ or ‘Do I want to have more time to do other stuff that’s going to benefit me for the future?’”

-Nick Trumble

And benefit him it did, as with the free time Nick now had since moving away from basketball and joining the fraternity allowed him to build connections and network around campus. He started working under Tim Clark, who was the previous SID and happened to be an alumni of Omega Tau. Nick gives an immense amount of credit to Tim for allowing him to learn all the behind the scenes of what it takes to cover an entire athletic program.

“It started out with me just helping out Tim a little bit here and there around the office, to eventually him trusting a 19 year old kid with setting up the broadcasts and traveling to all the different road games with him.”

Nick Trumble

It was on those road trips where he also gained a lot of knowledge from former KWED radio broadcaster, Mike McBride, on how to commentate live on air. Greg Burnett, former Head TLU Baseball Coach and now TLU Campus Rec Director, was another mentor on those trips in terms of creating the winning mindset for Nick to carryover into the SID department, as well.

Nick speaks highly of all three of those guys that built him into excelling with his role as the Assistant SID today, alongside Bryce Hayes. In fact, just last year, Nick and Bryce were named the Sports Information and Marketing Team of the Year in the conference.

With so much of their great work being recognized, I asked Nick how it feels the dynamic duo of him and Bryce has led to the growth of TLU Athletics as a brand.

“It feels good. I mean it’s hard for DIII schools to get the proper exposure media wise, but what’s worked with Bryce and I is that we’re both young and hungry. We have a lot of respect for what the other SID’s do in the conference, but I think with being younger we have a different perspective on a lot things as far as media goes and we know how to use that advantage to impact kids nowadays. You know I do a lot with recruits and it helps out our different sports and then in turn it helps us win. And when you win, you get the proper exposure that way, too. So everything we do is to help each sport be successful and give our student-athletes the best possible experience.”

– Nick Trumble

The standard around TLU Athletics is to win, plain and simple. Every sport has eyes on a championship and being the best they can possibly be, and that mindset is no different underneath Memorial Gymnasium where the SID offices reside. Those guys work just as hard as anyone else in the Athletic Department and the results have proved that.

Too Live U is what it is because of the work they’ve done and it’s only going to keep on growing from here.