“This is awesome, baby, with a capital A!” the ESPN sportscaster, Dick Vitale, cheered on 12th December 2024 after winning yet another battle. After months of waiting and 30 rounds of radiation, a PET scan showed no signs of cancer for the 85-year-old who was struck with it for the fourth time in the last 4 years. A story of hope and inspiration it sure has been.

Even at his age and despite all the adversities, Vitale is as cheerful as he could be, aiming big to get back behind the microphone again. After about 6 decades in the sport, his heart still stirs towards it and that’s no surprise.

Basketball had been a lifelong passion for Dick Vitale

Vitale has loved the sport since he was a child but only ever notably indulged in it after college. He started out at Garfield High School, coaching one year before he moved on to his alma mater, East Rutherford, where he had considerable success. Two consecutive state championships, 35 consecutive wins, and four state sectional championships across 7 years (1964-70), and the eventual ESPN broadcaster had begun well.

Rutgers followed next for Vitale but it was the University of Detroit that would stick with him. With a winning percentage of .722, he put the school on the map to eventually land an NCAA Tournament appearance in his final season there (1977). Vitale had resigned from the post due to bleeding ulcers but soon found himself back on the court, but at a much higher one this time.

On May 1st, 1978, the Detroit Pistons held a conference to introduce their new head coach, Dick Vitale. But it wasn’t his best year. For a team plagued with injuries, the coach managed a 30-52 record and the management wasn’t happy. “I had to get the maximum out of talent like Bob Lanier and Bob McAdoo. I wasn’t getting it done,” he had said. But call it a blessing in disguise because, in 1979, he called ESPN’s first college basketball broadcast and came to be the voice we know him as today.

But coaching and announcing weren’t the only ways Vitale made his love for the sport known.

Dick Vitale’s Mount Rushmores of College Basketball-Solid Gold Prime Time Performers From My Four Decades at ESPN and It’s Awesome, Baby!: 75 Years of Memories and a Lifetime of Opinions on the Game I Love, have been two of the books authored by him.

While his coaching record (341-239) was solid, it was his energy and personality behind the microphone that truly made him a legend in the sport. Getting to be in the position, Vitale calls it an American Dream. “I’m living the American dream,” he had said. “I may not always be right, but no one can ever accuse me of not having a genuine love and passion for whatever I do. And ESPN has been grateful enough to recognize this.” 

Well, “Rolls Roycer” and “diaper dandy” we have all come to recognize. But a few painful memories would soon follow.

Vitale battles time and again

It was in 2021 that the announcements of adversities began. Melanoma came first with Vitale breaking the news in August, saying he had beaten it. But about two months in and non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma brought troubles. There passed six months before the broadcaster announced he was free of it, thanks to the many chemotherapy sessions. Over a year later, in June 2023, his vocal chord cancer made the news. He would undergo radiation treatment until December that year carried the good news.

He calls it an awful experience, but the love for and from his family and fans keeps him going. He also wants to get back to broadcasting one day, admitting, “I know the players, the teams, and the game. Being courtside, hearing the fans chant ‘Dickie V,’ that’s the best medicine I could ever have. I told my doctor, ‘It’s what keeps me alive.’” So he was preparing to get back to his seat for this season, but as fate would have it, in June this year, a biopsy of a lymph node in his neck showed cancer.

He remained positive from the get go, dishearteningly having gotten used to it by now. “With all the (prayers) I have received & the loving support of my family, friends and ESPN colleagues, I will win this battle,” he had said. And well, we know how that turned out.

Even in the adversity, Vitale looked towards a brighter side. Not only did he help himself, but made immense efforts to ensure some help towards others, especially children, who have to live through painful processes.

The sportscaster aims to make a difference

One of Vitale’s closest friends, ESPN broadcaster Jim Valvano, was another who was diagnosed with cancer. He passed away in 1993, aged 47. Vitale was right there in his one final moment of glory as he received Arthur Ashe Courage and Humanitarian Award. He was helped but the stairs by the former Detroit HC before he went on to accept the honor and eventually announce the formation of the Jimmy V Foundation for Cancer Research.

Valvano might no longer be with us, but Vitale has continued his legacy. “Jimmy’s legacy is incredible. Think about the lives that he’s affected and will continue to affect year after year, with more dollars for research,” he said about the foundation that has managed to raise about $400 million. The broadcaster himself, as a member of the board of directors, managed to raise nearly $93 million for pediatric cancer, including $24.8 million this year alone through his annual Dick Vitale Gala.

“I can tell you that’s my number one priority now in life is to raise as many dollars as I can for kids battling that disease,” he says. The next event happens in May 2025, in the presence of icons like Nancy Lieberman, Hannah Storm, Dan Hurley, and more, who will also be honored. Vitale might have won his battle, but he is aware there are many who struggle and through his story or through his efforts, the 85-year-old is doing his bit.