Kentucky legend Jack Givens is the Cats’ new radio analyst. ‘For the fans, he’s family.’
Not that he had any doubts that everything would work out, but there was a moment toward the end of Kentucky’s basketball trip to the Bahamas this summer that told Tom Leach exactly what he was getting with his new radio partner.
To that point, the Wildcats had rolled through their August exhibition schedule — winning their first three games in the Bahamas by a combined 176 points — but they found themselves trailing the Bahamas National Team by eight points with a few minutes to go until halftime.
Jack “Goose” Givens then jumped in to make the point that if senior forward Jacob Toppin was really going to take his game to another level in the upcoming season — as many expected he would — this would be an ideal time to assert himself, put his team on his back, and rally the Cats from an unexpected deficit.
“And just within a minute or two, that started to happen,” Leach recalled this week. “Jacob hit a shot. Made a couple of defensive plays. Hit another shot. And he sparked a run that got them back on top by one by the end of the half. And I just thought it was a very astute point.”
Leach added that Toppin had to do his part to make good on Givens’ point — “So kudos to Jacob, too,” he said — but call it a sign of sorts that the right person would be seated courtside once the 2022-23 season tipped off in Rupp Arena a few months later.
“It just showed how good he’ll be at this job,” Leach said.
UK officially announced the obvious Thursday, revealing that Givens would be the new analyst for the Wildcats’ radio broadcasts. He steps into the role previously occupied by fellow Kentucky great Mike Pratt, who passed away in June at age 73. Pratt had been UK’s radio analyst since 2001, calling games alongside Leach for the past 21 seasons.
Givens joined the team’s broadcasts two years ago as co-host of the UK pregame radio show with Dave Baker, and it was announced Thursday that former Kentucky player Cameron Mills will slide into Givens’ old role next to Baker starting this season.
One of the brightest stars in Kentucky basketball history, Givens needs no introduction to Wildcats’ fans. He was the state’s Mr. Basketball in 1974 — a standout at Bryan Station High School in Lexington — and signed with UK, ultimately becoming one of the program’s greatest players over a college career that culminated in his 41-point performance to lead UK past Duke in the 1978 national championship game. Givens was a first-round NBA Draft pick later that year and is still third on Kentucky’s all-time scoring list.
Not long after his NBA career ended in 1980, Givens returned to Kentucky and — at the invitation of longtime UK announcer Ralph Hacker — called some Sweet Sixteen games on the radio for WVLK. That was the start of his second career in sports — one he never imagined doing during his playing days.
“I never thought about it until that time,” Givens said. “It was something that I immediately enjoyed. Doing the high school games on the radio and Transylvania games — those kind of games, I really enjoyed it right from the beginning. My challenge was to try and get better at it. And with the years and experiences that I had, I was able to get better at it. I’m still trying to get better at it. But, no, I had no idea I would ever be doing this.”
Givens went on to a career as a color analyst for NBA games, most notably serving in that role on the Orlando Magic’s TV broadcasts for 15 years.
Joining the UK pregame show in 2020 put him back in basketball after more than a decade away from broadcasting.
‘Having an opportunity to get back in the booth, if you will, and to be a part of a great program like the University of Kentucky — and, obviously, an opportunity to work with Tom, after listening to him for years and years and years — is quite an honor,” he said. “I was happy to be on the pregame show, because that gave me an opportunity to get back into the game. So I was really excited about that. Doing in-game stuff, obviously, is different. I’m looking forward to it.”
UK’s new radio team
Just as the Wildcats’ trip to the Bahamas in August gave the UK players an opportunity to work on their chemistry on the court, Givens and Leach were granted a preseason of sorts to get on the same page behind the microphones.
“I didn’t notice any rust,” Leach said of his new partner. “And I don’t know that we hardly ever stepped on each other. So it seemed to just click pretty instantly.”
This isn’t the first time the pair have teamed up on radio.
Leach and Givens actually called high school games together in the ’80s, when the current “Voice of the Wildcats” was just starting out and before Givens began his NBA broadcasting career. “Way back in the day,” as Givens put it.
“It was a great treat to be able to work with one of the all-time great Wildcats,” Leach said of that early career assignment, adding that he remembered listening as a kid to the epic battles between Bryan Station and Henry Clay when Givens and James Lee were Lexington high school players (before both signed with Kentucky and later teamed up for a national title).
“I don’t want to make Jack feel too old, because he’s not that much older than I am,” said Leach, a 1983 UK grad.
If they immediately jelled on air in the Bahamas, there’s a good reason.
Givens said so many years of calling games in the NBA has affected the way he watches them as a fan. He recalled syncing up his TV to listen to Leach and Pratt and thinking about what he would say in certain situations.
“So, for me, that’s some experience in itself,” he said.
Even sitting in the stands at Rupp Arena — or tuning in to a college or NBA game on TV — he finds his mind naturally drifting to color commentary.
“I’m watching more away from the ball than I am necessarily on the ball, because away from the ball is usually what people do not see,” he said. “Why a guy scored — they know who scored, but they may not see the screen that happened on the weakside of the floor that allowed him to flash into the middle wide open. So those are the kind of things that — as I’m watching a game — I think, ‘Man, I would be pointing that out.’ ‘That was a great screen.’ ‘He went and chased that rebound down, it didn’t just come to him.’
“So, little things like that. I’m trying to pick up on all of that stuff. And saying, ‘Man, I would be sharing this.’ Because it deserves to be talked about.”
The bulk of Givens’ broadcasting experience has come as a TV analyst, and there are clear differences between that role and calling games for a radio audience.
“Tom really has to paint the picture so people see what’s going on. And he’s awesome at that,” he said. But he’s also really good at giving that analyst an opportunity to jump in and to make a point — although quickly — and get out of his way. So I think we have a little more growing to do, in that regard, but I felt so comfortable working with him down in the Bahamas that I know it’s only going to get better.”
One example of a more-or-less unwritten rule of basketball games on the radio: once a basket is made and the play-by-play announcer has called it, the color analyst has until the ball makes it to halfcourt to make his point. Then it’s the play-by-play guy’s turn to jump back in and call the action. It might sound simple, but the announcers are at the mercy of the pace of the game in these instances.
“I have to be out of there by the time the ball gets to halfcourt,” Givens explained. “And sometimes the ball gets to halfcourt in one pass! So it might be that I have something I want to say, but I have to understand that — unless another opportunity comes for me to work that in — I’m going to have to save that for the next game. So it is difficult. And there’s an art to it, I’m sure. I’m still trying to figure that out, but it’s coming.
“But it helps to have a guy like Tom, who knows how to lead you and lead you quickly into something. And give you an opportunity to make your point. I just have to make my point quickly and get out of his way. And let him do what he does.”
Part of the Kentucky ‘family’
One highlight of Pratt’s career as a UK broadcaster was the postgame player interview. A former Wildcat standout himself, Pratt had a natural ability to relate to the younger Kentucky players and, seemingly, make them feel comfortable speaking on air after the games.
It’s something Givens is looking forward to, and part of building that trust is being around the team and getting to know the guys off the court.
“They’re getting a little bit more familiar with me,” he said. “Of course, I’m the old man. But they know I’m somebody, because I’m around all the time. And when I have a chance to talk to them, I throw some stuff at them. And it seems to impress them a little bit, at least. Especially winning a championship and playing in the league and the stuff that means a lot to these players.”
During his time on the Magic broadcasts, Givens was tasked with doing those player interviews over the course of an 82-game season. So he has plenty of experience.
“I think the thing that makes an interview is letting the people hear from the player,” he said. “They don’t want to hear from me. So I have to set them up and try to help them feel comfortable talking to me. And, you know, ‘You have to forget about all the people listening, man. This is just a conversation between you and me. And we’re just sitting here in the gym talking.’ So, the big challenge is to get guys to feel comfortable talking to you. And Mike was great at that.”
Leach said a major part of his on-air rapport with Pratt over the past 21 years came as a result of them getting along so well off the court. They’d spend time together at team practices, dinners, road trips during the season, and so on, building a chemistry that naturally flowed into the broadcasts, where they developed their own non-verbal language during games so as to set up the other and stay on the same page while calling the action.
It’s early, but Leach said he already feels things have “clicked” well with Givens, though — like all basketball teams should — he expects they’ll be better in January than they are in November.
“Jack’s easy to work with,” he said. “He brings a lot of the qualities that Mike brought to the job, in terms of knowing the game. Knowing it as a player, as a scout. When you’re talking about Kentucky guys, you’re talking about future NBA guys, so he knows what he’s talking about, in terms of projecting guys to that level.
“And he has a great love for the UK program — as Mike did — and knows the history of it and can talk about that. And I think, for the fans, he’s family. It’s just a really comfortable fit.”
This story was originally published October 13, 2022 at 10:07 AM.
