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Brent Musburger has been one of the most prominent voices on the national sporting landscape since 1975. On Tuesday, his fine career as a play-by-play man came to an end with one final broadcast. Musburger was on the call for what turned out to be an overtime win for Kentucky against Georgia but, as you may expect, the results of the contest ended up taking a back seat to various tributes put forth for the legendary announcer.
Before reaching the lengthy tribute to end the evening, the celebration began with Kentucky, who hosted the game at Rupp Arena, presenting Musburger with a jersey and it was head coach John Calipari that did the honors.
https://twitter.com/ESPNCBB/status/826616118336974851
From there, it was one final reference to Musburger’s trademark opening line to each and every broadcast.
https://twitter.com/ESPNCBB/status/826616858799403008
During the game itself, the Kentucky cheerleading squad recruited the now 77-year-old broadcaster to present the “Y” in Kentucky and he did so with pure joy.
Brent Musburger is the Y. #BBN pic.twitter.com/BguEk2Px4W
— Jonathan Dunn (@Jonathan__Dunn) February 1, 2017
Finally, the festivities came to an end and, after plugging his new radio venture in Las Vegas and thanking fans, Musburger signed off the ESPN airwaves for a final time. But before that, ESPN aired a wonderful tribute video to the legendary broadcaster.
https://twitter.com/cjzero/status/826653657244561412
The entire evening was reminiscent of the CBS broadcast put forth for Verne Lundquist just weeks ago and the absence of Musburger and Lundquist from broadcasts moving forward will be quite odd. It appears that Musburger won’t be fading away thanks to his Vegas broadcasting plans, but even if he’ll be around to some extent, ESPN executed a proper send-off and, fittingly, he rode off into the sunset after calling what actually ended up being a fantastically entertaining college basketball game.
