A new documentary series on an Italian professional soccer team and its celebrity American owners will premiere at 7 p.m. today on ESPN.
“Running with the Wolves,” a four-part series, follows the team and majority owners Kelly Ripa and Mark Consuelos as the season progresses.
The show has a local connection.
Patrick Chovan, of Hermitage, Pa., is a minority owner of the team. He is shown in the first episode, on the field during the first game of the season and at a post-game dinner.
Chovan, who is the president of Omega Lumber in Wheatland, Pa., is a lifelong soccer fan who bought into the team a couple years ago. He can scarcely believe how far the ownership journey has taken him.
“It’s been the honor of a lifetime to be part of this Campobasso journey from the very beginning,” he said. “What started as a wild dream three years ago has grown into something so much bigger than I could ever imagine, and to see it brought to life on screen by ESPN is surreal. It’s a reminder that if you dream big enough and work hard enough, truly anything is possible.”
The first two one-hour episodes of the series will air at 7 and 8 p.m. this evening. The third and fourth episodes will air at 7 and 8 p.m. Thursday. The series will be available to view immediately after its ESPN premiere on ESPN+ and will become available on Hulu and Disney+.
“Running with the Wolves” follows the Campobasso FC Wolves, a Serie C pro soccer club in that southern Italy city. Italian soccer is divided into four categories, or serie, and teams can be moved up to a better serie, or relegated down to a lesser serie, after each season depending on its win-loss record.
Ripa and Consuelos are the long-married couple who are the co-hosts of the daytime TV talk show “Live with Kelly and Mark.”
Since taking the reins of the team in 2022, they have helped breathe new life into it and reignited its loyal fan base. Chovan also bought into the club that year.
He stressed that Ripa and Consuelos did not buy the team to create a docuseries. “It evolved,” he said. The couple pitched the idea to production companies, eventually settling on Left/Right and Milojo, in collaboration with ESPN.
Chovan has become friends with Consuelos, who he said takes a hands-on approach to the team and the film project. “We watch every game and then talk about it, and the TV project, the next day, like Monday morning quarterbacks,” he said.
He has met Ripa only once, and that was at the docuseries premiere’s red carpet event last week.
Chovan is impressed with the high-profile couple. “They are extremely humble and gracious,” he said, “and very family oriented.”
The Episodes
The series begins as the Wolves enter their 2024-25 season.
Fans have put pressure on the owners to have a successful season, but the team is depleted by injuries. The Wolves’ margin for error is slim as it faces relegation into a lower league.
Viewers get a look at how Ripa and Consuelos balance the pressures of ownership, family life, their careers and their dream of leading Campobasso FC to glory.
“Running with the Wolves” is “a dramatic, inspiring and often humorous behind-the-scenes look at what it takes to transform a soccer club,” according to a press release from ESPN.
In the same release, Ripa and Consuelos say Campobasso FC “represents the underdog that lives in all of us.”
Here’s a look at each episode:
- Episode 1: “Leading the Pack” (7 p.m. July 29, on ESPN): Ripa and Consuelos prepare for their third season as Italian soccer club owners. Consuelos faces crucial roster decisions as Campobasso must sign and cut players before their first game of the season.
- Episode 2: “Home Games” (8 p.m. July 29, on ESPN): Ripa travels to Campobasso for the first time as she and Consuelos explore buying a home in Italy. Consuelos begins to have doubts about the team’s head coach as they prepare for an epic rivalry match.
- Episode 3: “The Time Is Now” (7 p.m. July 31, on ESPN): Consuelos must make a tough decision after a prolonged losing streak finds Campobasso’s head coach on the hot seat.
- Episode 4: “The Wolves Den” (8 p.m. July 31, on ESPN): Campobasso fans protest the team as the Wolves battle to avoid relegation. Ripa and Consuelos travel to Italy for the final game of the season.
A Lifelong Fan
Chovan never dreamed he would one day own a team.
“I’m a huge soccer fan, especially Italian soccer teams,” he told The Business-Journal in a 2023 interview shortly after he bought his share of the team.
The opportunity to buy into the team presented itself “through a surreal chain of events,” he said.
It all started when Chovan contacted the operators of AmericaDomani.com, a website of Italian American culture that he enjoys. He wanted to see if the site was looking for contributors or investors.
“Then I saw that the North Sixth Group of New York City was behind it, and my interest was piqued,” he said. “I knew of them because of their investments in Italian soccer.”
He was told about the investment opportunity in the Campobasso team and leaped at it.
North Sixth is the majority owner, with a stake of 70% to 80% of the team. Chovan is one of a handful of minority owners.
He traces his own family heritage to the southern Italian city of Caserta – just 50 miles from Campobasso.
Chovan also sees a link between Campobasso and the Youngstown-Sharon area, because both are hard-working communities that have been economically left behind. “They are an underdog,” Chovan said. “It’s like the Rust Belt.”
Chovan, who grew up in Hubbard, Ohio, played soccer all his life. When he was a child, his mother regularly visited family in Italy, and he corresponded with his cousins there by writing letters.
The Chovan family business, Omega Lumber, was started in 1976 by Chovan’s father. Chovan took over as president in 2014.
The lumber producer has its main facility and headquarters in Wheatland, Pa., with production facilities in Greenville, Harrisville, Clintonville and New Wilmington, Pa.
The company is an industrial – not retail – lumber provider with niches in railroad ties and pallets, Chovan said.
Pictured at top: Patrick Chovan gives a postgame interview with journalist Francesco Presutti.