The partnership between TNT Sports and ESPN is bringing a pair of basketball icons together. Charles Barkley and Dick Vitale will pair up to call two college basketball games this season — one in the regular season and one in the NCAA tournament. ESPN announced the news Monday.
Barkley and Vitale will first work together Dec. 13 when No. 18 Kentucky hosts No. 22 Indiana for a broadcast on ESPN. Dave O'Brien will call play-by-play for that game while Barkley and Vitale offer color analysis.
They'll work again together to call a First Four NCAA tournament game in March that will be broadcast on truTV. The play-by-play announcer for that game has not been announced.
Vitale has been the voice of ESPN's college basketball coverage since the network's inception in 1979. With CBS holding the rights to the NCAA tournament, Vitale's never called a tournament game.
But CBS partnered with TNT Sports to expand its tournament coverage in recent years. And ESPN and Turner Sports have partnered for multiple deals, includingthe high-profile arrangement for ESPN to carry TNT's beloved NBA studio show "Inside the NBA"starting this season.
With that, the door opened for the Barkley-Vitale pairing announced Monday. Barkley has been a mainstay of TNT Sports' NCAA tournament studio coverage alongside his "Inside the NBA" co-hosts Ernie Johnson and Kenny Smith. Now he'll work the game broadcast mic alongside Vitale.
Together at last
Barkley and Vitale have long wanted to work together. They both spoke about their desire to team up on the air fora 2013 interviewwith Sports Illustrated's Richard Deitsch.
"I told these guys one of my goals is to do a game with Dick Vitale," Barkley told Deitsch. "I would love to do a game with Dick Vitale because I think he has been great for college basketball. It'd be good for the game."
Vitale shared similar a similar sentiment with Deitsch.
"Both of us have a love for the game and it would be a lot of fun," Vitale said. "You never know what will come out of his mouth, and I like to think my energy and enthusiasm would jump out with Charles."
Vitale, 86, has stepped away from broadcasting on multiple occasions in recent years across repeated bouts with cancer. After beingdeclared cancer-free in January,Vitale returned to the micon Nov. 4 for a game between Texas and Duke.
