The day CBS pulled an analyst out of the stands

The date was 3/14/1982 and the event was the NCAA tournament 2nd round game between Idaho and Iowa played in Pullman, Washington. For this regional telecast, CBS (which was televising its first NCAA tournament) assigned play-by-play broadcaster Fred White and analyst Irv Brown.

Unfortunately, White suffered from laryngitis early in the game and was unable to continue. So CBS was forced to scramble and put together a revised broadcast team to call the remainder of the game. After an early timeout, Brown shifted into the play-by-play role despite never having done play-by-play before.Washington State coach George Raveling was in the arena as a spectator and CBS pulled him out of the stands to pinch-hit as the analyst and make his broadcasting debut. The duo of Brown and Raveling finished the game (which went into OT).

You can hear White stuggling quite a bit with his voice during this early part of this clip and Brown carrying the telecast leading into the first timeout. You can see the announcer transition take place at the 2:46 mark which Brown also references at the 4:19 mark.



This video is an interesting watch. The announcers frequently talk over each other and get loud at times. As you might expect, there are some awkward sequences (for example, see the 9:00 mark). But overall, I would say that both Brown and Raveling did a reasonable job under the unusual circumstances.

I'm also unclear as to how much advance notice Raveling got from CBS about serving as an analyst on this telecast. Or, for that matter, how much advance notice Brown got regarding the play-by-play possibility.

Raveling would subsequently work as a TV analyst for CBS for a few years in the mid-1990s and later for Fox Sports Net.