Mispronunciations happen, especially with a team or a sport someone isn’t familiar with. But the ones from Fox 5 DC’s Tischa Lewis about the NHL’s Vancouver Canucks‘ coaching change (from Bruce Boudreau to Rick Tocchet) were remarkable. On the Fox 5 DC 11 p.m. news, Lewis delivered this short report referencing the “Can-nukes” (it’s “Can-ucks”) twice, as well as “Bow-dreau” (it should be “Boo-dreau”) and “Tew-ket” (it should be “Tock-et”).
According to Fox 5 DC, the Vancouver "Can-nukes" made a coaching change Sunday. Have to watch out for those Canadian nukes, whether under control of Bruce "Bow-dreau" or Rick "Tew-ket." pic.twitter.com/A6AJAHXJSJ
— Awful Announcing (@awfulannouncing) January 23, 2023
“Former Washington Capitals coach Bruce Bow-dreau has been fired by the Vancouver Can, Can-nukes? The team announced the change Sunday, less than a week after president of hockey operations Jim Rutherford said major surgery was needed to fix the Can-nukes. Rick Tew-ket has been hired as Bow-dreau’s replacement.”
Then, on the 12 a.m. news, Lewis discussed this again. And that report saw the same mispronunciations for “Canucks” and “Tocchet,” and one of the same for Boudreau, but also a “Bow-drew” at the end.
This came up again in the next hour, with the same (for the most part) mispronunciations. pic.twitter.com/6kuxiN3OJN
— Awful Announcing (@awfulannouncing) January 23, 2023
“And former Washington Capitals coach Bruce Bow-dreau has been fired by the Vancouver Can-nukes. The team announced the change today. Rick Tew-ket was hired as Bow-drew’s replacement.”
As per her Fox 5 bio, Lewis has a long news background, but not a specific sports background. So that maybe helps explain what happened here. And this also was a short relaying of a headline (and it was probably only a headline in DC because, as mentioned in the report, Boudreau used to be the Capitals’ coach), not a detailed segment, so perhaps it wasn’t checked as carefully. And we all make errors. But this was a particularly prominent and repeated one, and one that was certainly funny to hear.
[Awful Announcing on Twitter; h/t to Chick Hernandez on Twitter]
About Andrew Bucholtz
Andrew Bucholtz has been covering sports media for Awful Announcing since 2012. He is also a staff writer for The Comeback. His previous work includes time at Yahoo! Sports Canada and Black Press.