Dick Vitale is one of college basketball’s defining and most enduring figures.
After coaching for 16 years, Vitale joined ESPN in 1979, only a few months into the network’s existence, and began calling college basketball games. In the years and decades that followed, his energy, exuberance and charisma made him one of the faces of the game.
He has helped provide the soundtrack for some of the sport’s most thrilling games and most unforgettable moments. His catchphrases like “diaper dandy” (an outstanding freshman) and “PTPer” (prime-time player) have been etched in the minds of any college basketball fan.
Over the past several years, though, Vitale hasn’t been the same kind of fixture of ESPN’s college basketball coverage as he was for so long, with other analysts sitting courtside for the network’s biggest games. Vitale has had to step away from his on-air duties several times since 2021, when he first announced that he had undergone treatment to remove melanoma.
His worst days and biggest health scares are hopefully behind him. After being away for nearly two full years, the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Famer will be on the call for No. 2 Duke’s game Saturday at No. 21 Clemson, marking his celebrated and much-anticipated return.
REQUIRED READING:Dick Vitale will call his first college basketball game in almost two years Saturday
Before that game tips off and Vitale’s unmistakable voice once again reaches the ears of millions of fans nationwide, here’s a closer look at why he has been away:
Dick Vitale cancer battle
In August 2021, about three months before the start of the college basketball season, Vitale announced that he had undergone surgery over the summer to remove melanoma, though once the growth was removed, it was found to not have spread elsewhere.
Two months later, however, Vitale had another health-related announcement, this time revealing he had been diagnosed with lymphoma. For that, Vitale had to endure a more rigorous treatment plan, which included six months of chemotherapy. Doctors informed him it had a 90% cure rate.
“I consider myself very lucky,” Vitale wrote in an essay for ESPN in October 2021. “I’ve seen firsthand the devastation that cancer can have on families, on children, and on all of our loved ones. It can bring you to your knees. It’s physically and emotionally exhausting. It robs you of so many things, including life itself for some of the most unfortunate patients. I never lose sight of that, and that’s why I feel so lucky.”
Later that year, pre-cancerous dysplasia and ulcerous lesions were discovered on his vocal cords. Between that and the chemotherapy treatments, Vitale stepped back from his work on ESPN’s college basketball coverage.
In April 2022, he announced that he was cancer-free and at that year’s ESPYS, he was presented with the Jimmy V Award for Perseverance, named in honor of famed NC State men’s basketball coach Jim Valvano, a good friend of Vitale’s who died in 1993 after a battle with cancer.
“I will tell you this Jimmy V, my man, we are not going to stop chasing the dream of raising dollars and your dream, Jimmy’s dream, to beat cancer,” Vitale said in a moving speech after receiving the award. “We must do it. Because it doesn’t discriminate. It comes after all. … Take a look at the room. It doesn’t matter — race, religion. It will bring you to your knees. There is only one way to beat it, my friends. We have to raise dollars and give the oncologists a fighting chance.”
The following April, he was on ESPN’s international broadcast of UConn’s 76-59 victory against San Diego State in the 2023 NCAA Tournament championship game. It’s the most recent game he has called.
In July 2023, Vitale was again diagnosed with cancer in his vocal cords. He underwent radiation treatments and was advised by doctors to rest his voice, even once he was declared cancer-free. That recovery process sidelined him for the entirety of the 2023-24 season.
In June 2024, he was diagnosed with cancer for a fourth time in less than three years, with a biopsy of a lymph node in his neck showing cancer, which was removed during a surgical procedure a few days later.
REQUIRED READING:Dick Vitale returns to ESPN on Saturday for Duke basketball vs. Clemson game
Dick Vitale return
After everything he’s endured, Vitale received some much-needed good news last December, when a doctor informed him that a scan showed that he was cancer-free.
Vitale excitedly announced the news on social media, noting that “SANTA CLAUS came early” and that “I’m cutting the nets down baby it’s my National Championship!”
Once again cancer-free, Vitale had been scheduled to return to the air for another Duke game — the Blue Devils’ Jan. 25 game at Wake Forest — but that was pushed back after he was hospitalized following a fall at his Florida home.
In an interview this month with the Sarasota Herald-Tribune, Vitale said that while he’s admittedly nervous about Saturday, he has been more overwhelmed by gratitude than anything else.
“There were moments I wasn’t sure I’d ever sit courtside again,” he said to the outlet. “Long stretches where I had no voice at all. It was a roller coaster — highs, lows, moments of doubt. But through it all, I kept fighting, believing, and praying. The last time I called a game was on April 3, 2023, the national championship, UConn versus San Diego State for ESPN International. That feels like a lifetime ago. But now? Now, I get to do it again.”
It’s quite the welcome development, one that, as Vitale would say, is awesome, baby.
Dick Vitale age
Born on June 9, 1939, Vitale is 85 years old.
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