Villanova Univeristy Athletics

Frank Boal was a three-year starting running back for Villanova from 1966-68 and is one of 34 players in school history (through the 2019 season) to surpass 1,000 career rushing yards.  He stayed with the Wildcats as an assistant coach upon his graduation and later went on to become a successful sportscaster in a career that spanned four decades.  Boal graduated from Villanova in 1969 with a degree in Finance and was inducted to the Varsity Club Hall of Fame in 2007.
  
In his three varsity seasons from 1966-68, Boal was a member of Wildcats teams which were a combined 16-13 (.552). He was a senior captain for the 1968 season and his collegiate playing career spanned the final year of Alex Bell’s seven seasons as head coach and the first two years under John Gregory.  Villanova tallied winning records in the 1966 (6-3) and 1968 (6-4) campaigns, while the team was 11-2 at home during Boal’s career.
  
Boal led the Wildcats in scoring with five total touchdowns and 30 points in both the 1966 and 1967 seasons.  He was also the team’s leading rusher in 1966 when he ran for 410 yards and four touchdowns on 122 carries.  Boal also tallied 11 receptions for 149 yards in 1966 and finished the season with 559 total yards from scrimmage.  He increased that total to 652 yards in 1967, including 317 rushing yards on 116 attempts and 335 receiving yards on 24 receptions.  As a senior in 1968, Boal had 278 rushing yards and 115 receiving yards.  He also completed 5-of-12 passes for 79 yards in his career.
 
Boal recalled that during his time at Villanova he assumed there was a chance he would be drafted into service during the Vietnam War.  That call never came, and he began to consider a different career path outside of coaching.  He moved to California and drove Wells Fargo Bank trucks during the day while taking night classes and studying journalism at San Francisco State.  His first job as a TV reporter was in Grand Coolee, Wash. and he moved on to stops in Eureka, Calif. and Green Bay, Wis.  Boal’s big break in the industry came when he took a job at WDAF-TV in Kansas City.
  
It was no coincidence that Boal’s career path was gradually moving him east, as he hoped to one day make it back closer to his childhood home in Pittsburgh, Pa.  Instead he found a home in Kansas City and he stayed at WDAF-TV for 28 years before moving to KSHB-TV for another eight years, becoming the sports director there in 2015.
  
Boal’s first assignment at WDAF-TV was to cover the 1981 NBA playoffs, specifically the Western Conference Finals between the Kansas City Kings and the Houston Rockets.  It was four more years before the Kings relocated to Sacramento.
  
Many of the most memorable moments in Kansas City sports history occurred during Boal’s career as a sportscaster.  He covered the 1983 U.S. Open in which Tom Watson nearly won a second straight championship at Oakmont Country Club in Boal’s native Pittsburgh.  He was also there for both of the Kansas City Royals championship seasons, covering the World Series in 1985 and 2015.  Boal delivered an hour-long broadcast of George Brett’s induction to the National Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown and covered the Kansas City Chiefs’ rise in the 1990’s under general manager Carl Peterson and head coach Marty Schottenheimer.  He would cover more than a dozen Chiefs playoff seasons under six different head coaches.
 
In all, Boal covered three World Series appearances by the Royals; Major League Baseball All-Star Games; Sporting KC; college athletics at the University of Missouri; the University of Kansas and Kansas State University; and high school sports.  He was a regular contributor on Sports Radio 810 WHB throughout his television career and continued his radio appearances following his retirement in 2017.