WPRT-FM (102.5 FM, "ESPN Nashville, The Game") is an ESPN Radio- affiliated

sports Sport pertains to any form of competitive physical activity or game that aims to use, maintain, or improve physical ability and skills while providing enjoyment to participants and, in some cases, entertainment to spectators. Sports can, ...

FM radio station broadcasting at 102.5 MHz. It is licensed to the city of Pegram, Tennessee, but serves the Nashville and Clarksville/ Hopkinsville markets. The station's studios are located in southeast Nashville along the

Murfreesboro Murfreesboro is a city in and county seat of Rutherford County, Tennessee, United States. The population was 152,769 according to the 2020 census, up from 108,755 residents certified in 2010. Murfreesboro is located in the Nashville metropol ...

Road ( U.S. 41/

70S Ribosomes ( ) are macromolecular machines, found within all cells, that perform biological protein synthesis (mRNA translation). Ribosomes link amino acids together in the order specified by the codons of messenger RNA (mRNA) molecules to for ...

), and the transmitter is located between Clarksville and Dickson in the

unincorporated Unincorporated may refer to: * Unincorporated area, land not governed by a local municipality * Unincorporated entity, a type of organization * Unincorporated territories of the United States, territories under U.S. jurisdiction, to which Congress ...

community of Cumberland Furnace. WPRT-FM is owned by the

Cromwell Radio Group Cromwell Radio Group is a privately held radio broadcasting company based in Nashville, Tennessee. They currently own and operate 32 stations: History The company was founded in 1969 when founder and president of the Company, Bayard H. Walters ap ...

. It is jointly operated and marketed with 102.9 WBUZ "The Buzz", with which it shares ownership management and a sales staff. WPRT-FM broadcasts in the HD radio format.

Station history

WPRT callsign history

Originally, WPRT was the call sign for the now-defunct 105.5 FM in Prestonsburg, Kentucky and was the "sister" station to WPRT-AM 960 in Prestonsburg. Today while WPRT-AM still exists, its former "sister" station moved to 105.3 FM and now uses the call sign

WXKZ WXKZ-FM (105.3 FM broadcasting, FM, "Oldies 105.3 The Kat") is a radio station licensed to serve Prestonsburg, Kentucky. The station is owned by Gearheart Communications and licensed to Adam D. Gearheart. It airs an oldies music format. In addi ...

and is owned by Gearheart Communications in

Harold, Kentucky Harold is an unincorporated community located in Floyd County, Kentucky, United States. A post office was established in the community in 1905, and named for local merchant Harold Hatcher of the Hatcher family of early area settlers. Profession ...

, and broadcasts an

oldies Oldies is a term for musical genres such as pop music, rock and roll, doo-wop, surf music (broadly characterized as classic rock and pop rock) from the second half of the 20th century, specifically from around the mid-1950s to the 1980s, as ...

format.

Early years

The station began its life as

WDKN WDKN (1260 AM) is a radio station operating in Dickson, Tennessee, on a frequency of 1260 kHz. It was formerly owned by Edmisson Communications, a local Dickson company. It is currently owned and operated by R & F Communications, also a loca ...

-FM in

Dickson, Tennessee Dickson is a city in the U.S. state of Tennessee. Located in Dickson County. it is part of the Nashville metropolitan area. As of the 2020 census, Dickson's population was 16,058. History Dickson was named for Congressman William Dickson, as w ...

, to which it was licensed and where it simulcast that small-town station's community-oriented format. When the station began to involve the Nashville market, its transmitter was moved to

Bellsburg, Tennessee Bellsburg is an unincorporated community in Dickson County, in the U.S. state of Tennessee Tennessee ( , ), officially the State of Tennessee, is a landlocked U.S. state, state in the Southeastern United States, Southeastern region of the ...

, on the

Dickson County Dickson County is a county located in the U.S. state of Tennessee. As of the 2020 census, the population was 54,315. Its county seat is Charlotte. Dickson County is part of the Nashville-Davidson–Murfreesboro–Franklin, TN Metropoli ...

- Cheatham County line and hence closer to Nashville. Later, the call letters were changed to WQZQ. For several years before 1996, the station broadcast a satellite-based classic rock format under the moniker Q102. From 1996 to 2005, the station broadcast a

Top 40 In the music industry, the Top 40 is the current, 40 most-popular songs in a particular genre. It is the best-selling or most frequently broadcast popular music. Record charts have traditionally consisted of a total of 40 songs. "Top 40" or "cont ...

format called 102.5 The Party. In 2005, when the station was relaunched as Venus 102-5 FM, it had to make a special request to obtain the WVNS-FM call letters. Per

FCC The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) is an independent agency of the United States federal government that regulates communications by radio, television, wire, satellite, and cable across the United States. The FCC maintains jurisdictio ...

regulations, they were required permission from

WVNS-TV WVNS-TV (channel 59) is a television station licensed to Lewisburg, West Virginia, United States, serving the Bluefield, West Virginia, Bluefield–Beckley, West Virginia, Beckley–Oak Hill, West Virginia, Oak Hill media market, market as an n ...

in Bluefield/ Beckley, West Virginia, which they received. The "Venus" moniker, however, lasted less than a year before changing to "V102-5". On weekdays, V102-5 ran a live, local hot adult contemporary format. However, on weekends, the station ran

Jones Radio Network Jones Radio Networks & Jones Media Group were branches of Jones International before being sold to Triton Media Group. JRN and JMN provide local radio stations with satellite-delivered formats. They also offer other services to local radio such ...

Hot AC Adult contemporary music (AC) is a form of radio-played popular music, ranging from 1960s vocal and 1970s soft rock music to predominantly ballad-heavy music of the present day, with varying degrees of easy listening, pop, soul, R&B, quiet sto ...

satellite format.

Stunt formats (August 2008)

On Tuesday, August 26, 2008, WVNS began stunting with teaser formats devoting to just one recording artist, starting with "102.5 Frank FM. All Frank, All the Time" playing nothing but songs featuring Frank Sinatra. Then on August 27, it went from an all-Sinatra format to an all-

Led Zeppelin Led Zeppelin were an English rock band formed in London in 1968. The group comprised vocalist Robert Plant, guitarist Jimmy Page, bassist/keyboardist John Paul Jones, and drummer John Bonham. With a heavy, guitar-driven sound, they are ci ...

format, featuring music from the legendary British rock group. This was followed on an all- Garth Brooks format on August 28, then finally on August 29, the format was changed to television

theme song Theme music is a musical composition that is often written specifically for radio programming, television shows, video games, or films and is usually played during the title sequence, opening credits, closing credits, and in some instances at ...

s, which lasted until 12 noon (CDT). The last song played was the appropriately titled " Welcome Back" by

John Sebastian John Benson Sebastian (born March 17, 1944) is an American singer-songwriter, guitarist and harmonicist who founded the rock band The Lovin' Spoonful. He made an impromptu appearance at the Woodstock festival in 1969CHR format to the Nashville airwaves, launching with Nelly's " Party People". Kidd Kraddick's syndicated program ''Kidd Kraddick In The Morning'' was featured in the morning drive until March 2010. The station changed its call letters to WPRT to match the "Party"

handle A handle is a part of, or attachment to, an object that allows it to be grasped and manipulated by hand. The design of each type of handle involves substantial ergonomic issues, even where these are dealt with intuitively or by following tr ...

. In 2009, WPRT began to add more rhythmic pop titles to its playlist, and by June shifted directions to

Rhythmic Top 40 The Rhythmic chart (also called Rhythmic Airplay, and previously named Rhythmic Songs, Rhythmic Top 40 and CHR/Rhythmic) is an airplay chart published weekly by ''Billboard'' magazine. The chart tracks and measures the airplay of songs played on ...

, thus resulting in

Mediabase Mediabase is a music industry service that monitors radio station airplay in 180 US and Canadian markets. Mediabase publishes music charts and data based on the most played songs on terrestrial and satellite radio, and provides in-depth analytic ...

and

Nielsen BDS Broadcast Data Systems (also known as BDS or Luminate BDS), is a service that tracks radio, television and internet airplay of songs. The service, which is a unit of MRC Data, is a contributing factor to North American charts published by co-owned ...

moving the station to their respective Rhythmic reporting panels the following July, even though non-Rhythmic flavored pop artists like

Taylor Swift Taylor Alison Swift (born December 13, 1989) is an American singer-songwriter. Her discography spans multiple genres, and her vivid songwriting—often inspired by her personal life—has received critical praise and wide media coverage. Bor ...

were still also played, a trend that other Rhythmics on the panel (like

KLUC-FM KLUC-FM (98.5 MHz) is a legacy commercial radio station located in Las Vegas, Nevada. KLUC airs a Top 40 (CHR) music format. Owned by Audacy, Inc., the station's studios are located in the unincorporated Clark County area of Spring Valley, w ...

Las Vegas Las Vegas (; Spanish for "The Meadows"), often known simply as Vegas, is the 25th-most populous city in the United States, the most populous city in the state of Nevada, and the county seat of Clark County. The city anchors the Las Vegas ...

and

WJFX WJFX (107.9 FM) is a Top 40 radio station located in Fort Wayne, Indiana. It is owned and operated by Adams Radio Group, LLC. WJFX broadcasts three channels in the HD digital format. History The station was an urban contemporary formatted r ...

/ Ft. Wayne) were also doing due to a changing taste among listeners. Because of its Rhythmic direction, WPRT now took on

Urban Contemporary Urban contemporary music, also known as urban music, hip hop, urban pop, or just simply urban, is a music radio format. The term was coined by New York radio DJ Frankie Crocker in the early to mid-1970s as a synonym for Black music. Urban conte ...

rival

WUBT WUBT (101.1 FM, "101.1 The Beat") is an American urban contemporary radio station broadcasting in the Nashville, Tennessee market, under ownership of iHeartMedia. Though the station is licensed to Russellville, Kentucky, its studios are locate ...

and Mainstream Top 40 rivals

WRVW WRVW (107.5 FM) is a radio station licensed to the city of Lebanon, Tennessee, but serving the nearby Nashville market. It is currently branded as 107.5 The River, broadcasting a Top 40 (CHR) format, and has become something of a heritage st ...

and

WNFN WNFN (106.7 FM, "Hot 106-7") is a Top 40 (CHR) formatted radio station in the Nashville, Tennessee market, broadcasting a Top 40 format. Its transmitter site is in Whites Creek, Tennessee and its studios are in Berry Hill, Tennessee. Previo ...

. On May 24, 2011, WPRT-FM changed its format to hot AC, still branded as "The Party".

Conversion to sports

On August 15, 2011, it was confirmed that WPRT would switch to a sports format. Adopting the new moniker "102-5 The Game", the format change took effect on Monday, August 29, 2011, at 6 AM, following a weekend of stunting of construction sounds,

Nashville Predators The Nashville Predators (commonly referred to as the Preds) are a professional ice hockey team based in Nashville, Tennessee. They compete in the National Hockey League (NHL) as a member of the Central Division in the Western Conference, and ha ...

highlights, and a loop for several hours of the closing chorus of " The Party's Over" by

Journey Journey or journeying may refer to: * Travel, the movement of people between distant geographical locations ** Day's journey, a measurement of distance ** Road trip, a long-distance journey on the road Animals * Journey (horse), a thoroughbred ra ...

. The station took over flagship status for the Predators after a one-year stint on sister-station 102.9 The Buzz. Upon its format change, the station announced it would become a primary affiliate of ESPN Radio six weeks after launch. This delay was due to ESPN Radio exercising an eight-week exit clause (executed two weeks prior to launch) in the contract with secondary affiliate WGFX-FM. Upon assumption of the affiliation, WPRT-FM began to carry various ESPN Radio programming including ''

The Herd with Colin Cowherd ''The Herd with Colin Cowherd'' is a sports talk radio show hosted by Colin Cowherd on Fox Sports Radio and Fox Sports 1. The show features commentary on the day's sports news, perspective on other news stories, and interviews with celebrities, spo ...

'', ''

SVP & Russillo ''The Ryen Russillo Show'' was a syndicated sports talk radio show hosted by Ryen Russillo. It was a part of ESPN Radio from 1 pm to 4pm, with all three hours also simulcasted on ESPNews. On April 26, 2017 Danny Kanell was let go by ESPN af ...

'', and ''SportsCenter Nightly''. In 2012, WPRT-FM became the new flagship for the Pacific Coast League's Nashville Sounds. On July 23 of that year, longtime Nashville sports radio personality

George Plaster George Plaster (born May 7, 1959 in Nashville, Tennessee) is a former collegiate sports administrator and a sports broadcasting personality. He previously served as associate athletic director at Belmont University. In May 2019 it was announced that ...

returned to the Nashville airwaves with the revival of his long-running afternoon drive-time talk show, ''SportsNight'', leaving in August 2016 to become associate Athletic Director at

Belmont University Belmont University is a private Christian university in Nashville, Tennessee. Descended from Belmont Women's College, founded in 1890 by schoolteachers Ida Hood and Susan Heron, the institution was incorporated in 1951 as Belmont College. It be ...

To improve its coverage in the eastern portion of the Nashville market, the station was simulcast over W271AB, a

translator Translation is the communication of the meaning of a source-language text by means of an equivalent target-language text. The English language draws a terminological distinction (which does not exist in every language) between ''transl ...

located in

La Vergne, Tennessee La Vergne ( ) is a city in Rutherford County, Tennessee. The population was 38,719 at the 2020 census. La Vergne lies within the Nashville Metropolitan Statistical Area. History La Vergne was incorporated in 1861. Historical variant names inc ...

. The simulcast ended on February 5, 2013, when W271AB switched to a simulcast of WPRT-HD2, with a

gospel Gospel originally meant the Christian message (" the gospel"), but in the 2nd century it came to be used also for the books in which the message was set out. In this sense a gospel can be defined as a loose-knit, episodic narrative of the words a ...

format, branded as "The Light". (In May 2017, the HD2 sub-channel and translator changed their format to urban oldies, branded as "102.1 The Ville".) WPRT-FM formerly served as the flagship station for the nationally syndicated talk show, ''The Dave Ramsey Show'', hosted by

Dave Ramsey David Lawrence Ramsey III (born September 3, 1960) is an American personal finance personality, radio show host, author, and businessman. An evangelical Christian, he hosts the nationally syndicated radio program ''The Ramsey Show''. Ramsey has ...

. ''The Dave Ramsey Show'' aired on 99.7

WWTN WWTN (99.7 MHz) is a commercial FM radio station serving the Nashville, Tennessee media market. The station is owned by Cumulus Media and is marketed as SuperTalk 99.7 WTN (the first W is eliminated for simplicity). WWTN operates at 100,000 ...

for over the previous 20 years before moving to WPRT-FM in January 2013. Management and staff of WPRT-FM and Dave Ramsey rapidly decided that his show would be more format-appropriate on a talk station than on a sports station, so WPRT-FM announced that it would discontinue ''The Dave Ramsey Show''. The last show aired on WPRT-FM on December 31, 2013. Dave Ramsey moved to

WLAC WLAC (1510 AM) – branded ''Talkradio 98.3 & 1510'' – is a commercial talk radio radio station licensed to serve Nashville, Tennessee. Owned by iHeartMedia, the station covers the Nashville metropolitan area. The WLAC studios are located ...

the next day. WPRT-FM has served as the flagship station for the

Middle Tennessee Blue Raiders The Middle Tennessee Blue Raiders are the men's and women's athletic teams at Middle Tennessee State University, in Murfreesboro, Tennessee. MT athletic teams participate in NCAA Division I ( Bowl Subdivision in football) in Conference USA. MT ...

since the 2013 college football season. On January 1, 2014, W235BW, a new translator at 94.9 MHz, was launched as The Game 2 (simulcasting programming from

WQZQ WQZQ (830 AM) is a radio station licensed to Goodlettsville, Tennessee, and serving the Nashville metropolitan area. The station is owned by Cromwell Radio Group, through licensee WYCQ, Inc. It airs a classic hits radio format, calling itself "C ...

), later re-named "94-9 the Fan." It serves as an overflow for 102.5 as well as the local Fox Sports Radio affiliate. It is also the home of Lipscomb Bisons basketball. On March 5, 2014, WPRT-FM's transmitter site was struck by lightning during a severe thunderstorm in the area and therefore was reduced to limited power. The transmitter site was fully restored and the station returned to broadcasting at full power on June 2, 2014. In 2016, the station launched an additional translator, W210CD, which is licensed in

Hendersonville, Tennessee Hendersonville is the largest city in Sumner County, Tennessee, on Old Hickory Lake. The population was 61,753 at the 2020 census. Hendersonville is the fourth-largest city in the Nashville metropolitan area after Nashville, Murfreesboro, ...

, broadcasting at 89.9 megahertz.

References

External links

WPRT-FM website
* * * * * {{coord, 36.293, N, 87.306, W, type:landmark_region:US_source:FCC, display=title PRT Sports radio stations in the United States Radio stations established in 1984