Chaminade's Thomas Gamba, Roman Brunetti on KidsCast broadcast for Little League Classic
Chaminade sports announcers, from left, Thomas Gamba and Roman Brunetti broadcast the Bryan Bonin Grand Slam Challenge at Farmingdale State College on June 23. Credit: James Escher
WILLIAMSPORT, Pa. — For Thomas Gamba and Roman Brunetti, it was meant to be.
The two Chaminade High School rising seniors and close friends attended the Bruce Beck Sports Broadcasting Camp at Iona University in early July. Both were part of a group selected to audition for ESPN’s KidsCast for Sunday night’s Little League Classic between the Mets and the Mariners.
The pairings for each audition were randomly selected, and Gamba and Brunetti fortunately were paired together to call a snippet of a July Mets game.
As expected, they crushed it.
They were on the call on ESPN2 for the eighth annual Little League Classic at Journey Bank Ballpark at Historic Bowman Field.
“I called [Brunetti] and I said, ‘Listen, I already knew there was no duo better than us,’ ” said Gamba, from Garden City. “I was very confident . . . I knew he was going to get it. So when Bruce called me, I heard the phone ring and I automatically knew it was Bruce. And then he said, ‘You got it.’
“I was like, ‘Thank you.’ And then I was like, ‘Who are my partners?’ And he was like, ‘Let me call them first.’ So I was on the edge of my seat. I was hoping it was Roman because I thought he did a great job, and then he called me back.”
Gamba, 17, was on the Kids-Cast broadcast for the Little League Classic for the second consecutive year after calling last August’s game between the Yankees and the Tigers.
Brunetti, 17, from Stewart Manor, earned his first taste of Williamsport. It has been unforgettable.
“It’s probably been one of the best weekends, if not the best weekend, of my life,” Brunetti said. “First, I’ve always wanted to just go to the Little League World Series. I watch it every single year. So to go and to experience that is cool. And then, obviously, I’m a big Mets fan, so to call a Mets game — obviously, I have to be down the middle, but to call a Mets game is just like a dream come true.
“I didn’t even think it was possible. I didn’t even know if we could consider it a dream until I got the opportunity. I’m so happy to be here. I’m just so thankful for everything that’s happened.”
Gamba and Brunetti called games for the Hamptons Collegiate Baseball League this summer.
On Sunday, they were joined by Pepper Persley, a 14-year-old from New York City in her fourth year as a KidsCast reporter.
Aidan Parnes, a rising sophomore at Lehigh University from Westport, Connecticut, interned for Beck’s camp and also was in Williamsport. He helped coordinate the auditions, and he noted how clear it was to everyone that Gamba and Brunetti are rising stars.
“They’re really good,” Parnes said. “Ed Cohen, the former Knicks play-by-play radio voice, said he was blown away after they did their stuff during the camp when he watched. “They’re professionals.”
Ben Dickson is Newsday Sports' general assignment reporter. He joined Newsday’s high school sports staff in 2023 after graduating from Maryland, where he covered several of the Terrapins' teams.
