FOR LATINO DUCK FANS, IT'S A WHOLE NEW BALLGAME.

Byline: Joe Mosley The Register-Guard

For three years, Juan DeDios Andrade has called the Civil War as a Castor. He's a Pato beginning today, and just happy to be part of the big game.

"How do I feel?" the Spanish-language play-by-play announcer said Friday. "I feel (like a) Duck."

Today's Civil War - or Guerra de Civil - will be the first University of Oregon football game to be broadcast live in Spanish, when Eugene radio station LaX 660 AM airs the contest at 3:45 p.m., with Andrade behind the microphone. The station's presentation will begin with its own pregame show at 3:15 p.m.

"We're doing it as a service to the Hispanic community, which is our goal and mission," said Phil Polter, the radio station's general sales manager. "We're bringing the Hispanic community closer to what goes on in Eugene-Springfield."

The station has reached an agreement with the university to carry today's game and future Duck football games, and is considering the possibility of covering UO basketball as well.

"We're so focused on getting this game done and really, really doing a quality broadcast," Polter said. "We're looking at the basketball, but that hasn't been determined yet."

Consultant Roy Larson of Waldport was not surprised by the radio station's decision to carry Oregon football games. His Larson Northwest Research and Consulting specializes in marketing to the Hispanic communities of Oregon, Washington and Idaho.

The new, Spanish-language football broadcasts will follow a trend in the Northwest and nationwide that has seen other stations offer Spanish-language broadcasts of Portland Trail Blazers basketball and Seattle Mariners baseball, along with the ESPN network's roll-out of ESPN Deportes, which offers nationwide television and radio programs in Spanish-language formats.

"It's a question of acculturation," Larson said of the Oregon Ducks football broadcasts. "As our region moves toward a bicultural Hispanic market, Latinos are going to be just as interested in college football ... as any other resident of the area. But they may feel more comfortable hearing the broadcast in Spanish."

Larson said his market research has shown that even among bilingual Hispanic residents, 60 percent prefer to receive advertising, radio programming and other media offerings in Spanish. And those Hispanic residents want to be a part of the same cultural events as their English-speaking neighbors.

"You have a group of resident Hispanics trying to do the best they can to acculturate with the local scene," Larson said. "And Oregon Duck football is definitely part of the local scene."

Interest in American sports has been developing for several years among Hispanic communities in the United States, said Andrade, the play-by-play announcer of today's Civil War game.

National Basketball Association games were the top draw during the era of Magic Johnson, Larry Bird and Michael Jordan, he said. But in recent years, interest has shifted to the National Football League - leading to last month's first-ever regular-season NFL game to be played on foreign soil. More than 103,000 people turned out in Mexico City for that game, between San Francisco and Arizona.

As Hispanic residents have become settled in their communities, they have followed their children's interest, and participation, in football and other local sporting events.

"They start following those (local) teams," Andrade said. "That's the way I get into college football, listening to my sons talking about the Ducks, talking about the Beavers."

Andrade began his radio broadcasting career 14 years ago with a Spanish-language station in Woodburn, and for the past three years was the station's play-by-play man at Beaver games. Then he was lured to Eugene for his job with LaX, and went from being a Castor, or beaver, to Pato, or duck.

"Five years ago, I would never think I would do something like this," Andrade said.

Joe Mosley can be reached at 338-2384 or jmosley@guardnet .com.