DAVIS, Calif. -- By now, radio listeners of UC Davis football have probably noticed the third voice on the Sports 1140 coverage of home games. That's Scott Barry, a 1984 All-American quarterback and a former teammate of head coach Dan Hawkins, who joined Scott Marsh and Doug Kelly for the 2019 opener against Lehigh, and has been part of each home broadcast since then.

The voice may not have been familiar, but the name and deeds are certainly well-known to longtime Aggie fans. As a sophomore, Barry started under center during UC Davis' lone appearance in the NCAA Division II title game. He enjoyed two full outstanding seasons as the starting QB, amassing 5,387 yards and 37 touchdowns overall – both No. 2 in school history at the time. He garnered Northern California Athletic Conference Player of the Year and Associated Press All-America status as a senior, eventually becoming the San Francisco 49ers sixth-round pick in the 1985 NFL Draft.

So how did Barry, who has lived in the Sacramento area for almost decade, just now become associated with the Aggie airwaves? 

You might say he was summoned. While attending a Rotary event at which Hawkins was a speaker, a guest in the audience asked a relatively technical question. "They asked what's the difference between the pre-snap read for a three-, five- or seven-step drop," Barry recalls. "Dan started to answer but he saw me sitting there and said, 'you're a quarterback, you answer.' I stood up, answered the question, then sat down."

A few days later, Coach Hawkins called Barry and asked if he would consider doing radio. After all, Hawkins had been a studio analyst for ESPN prior to his return to UC Davis, and knew a thing or two about how to communicate the game of football for the airwaves. Soon after, Barry came and spoke to the Aggies during their preseason camp. That sealed the deal: Barry subsequently met with Marsh and Kelly to determine how to best incorporate himself into the broadcast. Due to work and family constraints, he was only available for home contests. And since Marsh and Kelly had developed their chemistry as a duo for well more than a decade, Barry largely stays out of their way, contributing primarily during pregame and extended breaks.

"What's interesting about radio is that I'm more of a long-form guy," Barry says. "Like my talks to the QB academy, I love doing that. In radio, it's all short sound bites. Scott has to be quick. It's not like TV where you can talk over the action. It's been a little more improv-y, it's kept me on my toes. I've enjoyed it."

Barry also jokes that his wife, Mary-Alice, has also appreciated the new experience. "She said, 'being succinct will be good for you.' And I'm sitting on the coach, thinking, 'what's that supposed to mean?' My mom said the same thing. Does it mean I'm long-winded or something? Maybe a little bit."

While radio may be a new adventure for Barry, performance is not, nor is conveying words in an articulate manner. He worked as an actor for more the a decade, and wrote a one-man stage show shortly before his former Aggie teammate, Bo Eason, did similar. Barry wrote a book called The Greener The Grass with yet another former UC Davis football player, Matt Gersper. 

Furthermore, he adapted Adam Penenberg's book about the Ford-Firestone controversy, Tragic Indifference, and even had the script optioned for a Michael Douglas film, but the project went on hold after the legendary actor was diagnosed with cancer in 2010. More recently, Barry adapted a screenplay from Troon McAllister's golf novel, The Green.

Ultimately, the late Sochor earns an assist for reuniting Barry with his alma mater. The two would take in an occasional Aggie football game from Sochor's 50-yard-line seats. 

"My connection to UC Davis has always been the people," said Barry. "When I think about Davis, I think about the kind of people who are here. Coach Sochor was always my conduit for all those years. He was like a second father to me. He was my mentor and my friend. When he died, there was a void. I felt disconnected from the university."

Barry also admits he was not a regular attendee of UC Davis football games, other than that sporadic game with his former coach. Football seemed slower as a spectator than it did as a participant, he said. However, about four years ago, he found himself looking around the stadium, and his gaze caught the end zone berms (now known as the UC Davis Children's Hospital Family Zone) where many young children play on the grass during games. By then, Barry's daughter, Dalila, was four years old. He no longer saw through the eyes of a former quarterback but rather those of a father, and simply could not help but notice how family-friendly was the environment at an Aggie home football game.

"I kind of fell in love with the stadium," Barry said. "Then my wife and I would come to all of the home games. We'd get a bite from Buckhorn and sit there, picnic-style. Dalila would run around with all of the kids. I got to watch the game from the end zone, which is how you played the game."

(Okay, so maybe he still has some of the eyes of a former player.)

The arrival of Coach Hawkins bonded Barry to the campus even more, as the two were teammates on the 1982 national runner-up squad. Associate head coach Tim Plough also had similar father-son relationship with Coach Sochor, and invited Barry to coach and speak at the Aggies' Quarterback Academy summer camps.

Barry further got involved with the athletics department at the Aggie EVO networking event last basketball season. The department's student-athlete outcomes program was particular impressive to the NFL draftee-turned-mechanical engineer-turned-commercial real estate broker-turned-actor-turned-writer-turned-entrepreneur. "I was the weirdo who had done a lot of different stuff, and I'm standing next to Mike Shaw, who basically ran the Lawrence Livermore Laboratory. He's the smartest guy who ever played football here, and I suffer from what I call 'life wanderlust.'"

"When I first heard about Aggie EVO, I told Mike Lorenzen that I wished I had something like that when I was here," said Barry, echoing a common refrain from the alumni who have joined the EVO Pro network. "I wish someone had talked to me and asked, 'what do you really want to do?'

"I tell [the student-athletes], don't think about what you want to do, think about what you want your day to look like," Barry says. "I didn't know that being an engineer meant I would get up, put a suit on, sit in a cubicle, and look at plans all day. That doesn't work for me. I grew up in the country. I want to see daylight. I want to be on the move and I want to meet people. Engineering was the wrong thing for me to do."

Even now, Barry perhaps only half-joking recalls that his only 'A' grade came in speech writing, which should have been an early hint to a more suitable career path. At its core, Aggie EVO is about providing guidance for UC Davis student-athletes. It was at the suggestion of a friend that Barry left engineering for commercial real estate. It was yet another friend's offer to attend acting classes at Diablo Valley College, and acting ultimately led to his writing career. Another colleague asked Barry to take on a $50 million real estate portfolio, and still another advised him to pursue investment possibilities in Sacramento after the late 2000s housing bubble. In short, whenever a new opportunity arose, Barry applied the same work ethic and dogged pursuit that brought him success as a student-athlete. 

Today, he flourishes as a self-employed entrepreneur. He manages a portfolio of real estate and continues to write. Thus, when another friend – this time, Coach Hawkins – pointed him in the direction of the radio booth, Barry's history superseded hesitation.

"I said let's just see if it works," said Barry. "I've really enjoyed working with Scott and Doug. I don't know if I'm any good at it, but it has been nice to do.''

Saturday's Battle For The Golden Horseshoe game with Cal Poly kicks off at 4 p.m. Fans can tune into Scott Marsh, Doug Kelly and Scott Barry at 1140 AM or online via the TuneIn app.

ABOUT UC DAVIS: Providing a small-town community feel while providing a world-class academic experience, UC Davis is home to more than 37,000 students and centrally located between San Francisco, Lake Tahoe, and the Napa Valley. The No. 5-ranked public university in the nation according to the Wall Street Journal, and among the top 10 public universities nationwide according to U.S. News and World Report, UC Davis offers nearly 100 graduate programs and more than 100 academic majors across four colleges and six professional schools, ranking among the world and nation's best in numerous disciplines, including veterinary science, agriculture, and plant and animal programs.

AGGIE EVO: Established in 2017-18, the Aggie EVO System is UC Davis Athletics' investment in the primary mission of preparing student-athletes for a successful "launch" after graduation. Thanks to a collaboration of alumni, university resources, corporate partners, coaches and Student-Athlete Outcomes staff, all Aggies are guided over four years to acquire the skills, knowledge, opportunities and tools to better know and navigate the "World of Work" after graduating from UC Davis. Follow the Aggie EVO system on Twitter and Instagram at @AggieEVO.

DON'T MISS OUT: Season and single-game tickets for UC Davis football are now on sale by contacting the Athletics Ticket Office at (530) 752-AGS1 or by visiting us online at tickets.ucdavis.edu.