in 1997, station owner lovcom, inc. acquired a competing fm station. the call letters of that station were changed from kwyo-fm to kyti and it became the country music station, while the format on kroe was changed to oldies. throughout the 80s and 90s, kroe was known for local sports coverage, including live play-by-play of local area football and basketball games. kroe changed formats again in july 2004, this time dropping music in favor of a strictly news talk information format. after this format change, the sports coverage was moved to sister station kwyo.