Verne Lundquist shares his memories of calling two epic UK sports moments
Next month, Verne Lundquist, the iconic television sports broadcaster, will be in Lexington to accept the Tom Hammond Media Award at the eighth annual Bluegrass Sports Awards Banquet.
In a long career spent mostly with CBS, Lundquist, 78, is probably most associated with coverage of The Masters golf tournament and SEC football.
He was also the television voice of two of the most dramatic moments in University of Kentucky sports history.
Along with analyst Len Elmore, Lundquist was at the microphone in 1992 for the epic Duke-Kentucky NCAA Tournament game that was won in overtime on Christian Laettner’s buzzer-beater.
Working with color commentator Gary Danielson, Lundquist was also the play-by-play man in 2007 when Kentucky football upset No. 1 LSU in three overtimes in Commonwealth Stadium.
In a recent phone interview, Lundquist shared vivid memories of each event
‘There’s the pass to Laettner . . . ’
Duke’s 104-103 overtime win over Kentucky in the 1992 NCAA Tournament East Region finals is considered by many the greatest men’s college basketball game ever.
In words that will endear him to the Big Blue Nation, Lundquist says he believes Duke star Laettner should have gotten a punishment more severe than just the technical foul he received for his infamous foot stomp on the chest of a prone Aminu Timberlake in the second half.
“He probably should have been ejected,” Lundquist says.
Instead, Laettner stayed in the game and entered the eternal nightmares of UK backers with a clutch shot for the ages.
Lundquist’s call: “There’s the pass to Laettner. . . . Puts it up . . . YESSSSSS!!!!!”
In the years since, Lundquist says he has talked, fleetingly, with then-UK head man Rick Pitino about whether the coach regrets not having a defender on the ball with 2.1 seconds left when the inbounding Grant Hill threw the three-quarters-of-the-court pass that set up Laettner’s heroics.
“I don’t think (Pitino) will ever admit that he should have (had a defender on Hill),” Lundquist says.
Because he had such positive feelings about the excellence of the game — and felt good about the job he and Elmore did in calling it — Lundquist says he did not watch a tape of the broadcast for more than a decade.
However, on the morning of Kentucky’s 2003 NCAA Tournament Elite Eight contest with Marquette, Lundquist says CBS analyst Bill Raftery called him in his Minneapolis hotel room to tell him ESPN Classic was showing Kentucky-Duke from 1992.
“I thought, ‘OK, it’s time,’ and I flipped it on,” Lundquist says. “I picked it up about eight minutes into the first half and watched to the end. And I thought (of the broadcast quality), ‘Not that bad.’”
His one regret, Lundquist says, is that he didn’t mention on the air that Laettner was perfect in the game — the Duke star finished 10-for-10 from the field, 1-for-1 on three-point shots and 10-for-10 from the foul line.
“I didn’t mention it because I didn’t know,” Lundquist says. “Our statistician got so caught up in the game, he never told me.”
Lundquist says one of his favorite memories of UK-Duke has been largely overshadowed — the driving bank shot that Kentucky’s Sean Woods hit with 2.1 seconds left in overtime to put the Cats ahead 103-102.
“When he shot it — and it went over Laettner — and he banked it in, I said, ‘Where in the world did he find the courage to take that shot?’” Lundquist says. “And it was, in my view, a courageous shot.”
‘I don’t think so’
The size and fervor of the Kentucky crowd dominates Lundquist’s memories of UK football’s 43-37 triple-overtime upset of No. 1 LSU at Commonwealth Stadium in 2007.
“I remember going to the game, we were a little late,” Lundquist says. “I had to call Craig Silver, our producer, and say, ‘We are caught in traffic.’”
After a contest filled with pendulum swings, the game came down to one play. Down six in the third overtime, LSU had a fourth-and-2 at the 17-yard-line.
The Tigers ran the ball with Charles Scott. UK linebacker Braxton Kelley met him in the hole and took him to the ground.
For a passing moment, no one was sure whether or not LSU had extended the game with a first down.
Lundquist’s call: “I don’t know. I don’t think so. Kentucky wins!”
The game “is one of my top 10 SEC memories,” Lundquist says. “I remember the euphoria among the (UK fans) when the game was over. It was just amazing.”
‘I was very envious’
Now mostly retired — in 2018, Lundquist worked only The Masters and The PGA Championship for CBS — the broadcaster and his wife, Nancy, split their time between Steamboat Springs, Colo., and Austin, Texas.
Lundquist recently published a book, “Play By Play: Calling The Wildest Games In Sports — From SEC Football to College Basketball, The Masters and More.”
On Jan. 30, Lundquist will be in the commonwealth to accept the award named for Lexington native Hammond at the Bluegrass Sports Awards Banquet (for ticket information, visit https://www.eventbrite.com/e/2019-bluegrass-sports-awards-tickets-51977813038).
The two broadcasters had similar career arcs, Hammond at NBC and Lundquist mostly at CBS (but also ABC and TNT).
In fact, when CBS lost the rights to broadcast the Olympics and NBC gained them, Hammond inherited the figure skating play-by-play role previously held by Lundquist.
“Once we lost the Olympics, (Hammond) took over the spot that I had for three of them,” Lundquist says. ““I’ve admired (Hammond) but I don’t mind telling you, I was very envious of Tom after that.”
