Mike Patrick, a longtime ESPN play-by-play-announcer, has died. He was 80.
Patrick died of pure causes on Sunday in Fairfax, Va., his physician confirmed to the community on Tuesday.
The announcer joined ESPN in 1982 and have become a go-to sport caller for skilled and school sports activities. His final occasion was the AutoZone Liberty Bowl on Dec. 30, 2017, a sport by which Iowa State defeated Memphis 21-20.
Patrick was the lead announcer for “Sunday Night Football” from 1987 till 2005 — initially with former NFL quarterback Joe Theismann — and likewise appeared on numerous school soccer and basketball video games.
“I called him Mr. ACC as he had a great love for doing the big [Atlantic Coast Conference] games,” ESPN school basketball analyst Dick Vitale stated Tuesday. “Mike had great energy and a keen knowledge of ACC basketball, and I truly enjoyed sitting next to him calling so many special games over the years.”
In 2018, Patrick remarked that “It’s wonderful to reflect on how I’ve done exactly what I wanted to do with my life, adding: “At the same time, I’ve had the great pleasure of working with some of the very best people I’ve ever known, both on the air and behind the scenes.”
Patrick attended George Washington College and was commissioned as a second lieutenant within the Air Power earlier than beginning his broadcasting profession at a Pennsylvania radio station. Within the early Nineteen Seventies, he joined a TV station in Jacksonville, Fla.. Previous to his leap to ESPN, he was a sports activities reporter and weekend editor at a Washington, D.C. TV station.
“Mike Patrick called countless significant events over decades at ESPN and is one of the most influential on-air voices in our history,” Burke Magnus, president of content material for ESPN, stated. “Along with calling ESPN’s first-ever common season NFL sport and voicing the ‘Sunday Night Football’ franchise for 18 seasons, Mike’s work on school sports activities was distinctive.
“For 36 years, he called football and men’s and women’s basketball, including the Women’s Final Four and so many historic matchups between ACC rivals Duke and UNC. Our deepest condolences to Mike’s family and his many friends throughout the industry.”
