According to cbssports.com, sports broadcaster Jim Nantz is calling his last Final Four at the end of the 2022-2023 college basketball season. Although he is stepping away from NCAA Tournament coverage, he is still staying with CBS Sports for coverage of the NFL and golf. Nants’s first NCAA Tournament was back in 1986, the year after the field expanded to 64 teams. He worked as a studio host before he transitioned to play by play for the 1991 Final Four. He has been on the mic ever since, calling some of the sport’s most memorable games.
At 63 years old, Nantz cited a desire to have more time to spend with his family when speaking to the New York Post about his decision to leave the NCAA Tournament broadcast team. He stated that, “It is time with two young children and an older daughter that I spend more time at home, Daddy needs to be home.” His last Final Four will be in Houston which is where he attended college and got his start in broadcasting.
Nantz will be replaced by Ian Eagle for the Final Four play by play voice, an iconic college basketball voice in his own way, Eagle is the play by play voice of the Brooklyn Nets and has tons of NCAA Tournament and NFL broadcasting experience for CBS. Nantz told the New York Post that, “It’s his time, I will support him 1,000%. He doesn’t need my support. But I’m absolutely thrilled for him. He’s a great teammate. He’s been right in the middle of this NCAA Tournament for a long, long time. So he’s not dropping in from outside, I mean he’s going to be working an extra weekend. It happens to be the big one. And he is definitely capable and ready and will excel and he’ll take it to all new heights.”
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