Billy Packer, a legendary broadcaster and fixture at college basketball’s Final Four, has died, his family announced Thursday.
He was 82.
Packer’s son, Mark, told The Associated Press that his father had been hospitalized in Charlotte for the past three weeks and had several medical issues, and ultimately succumbed to kidney failure.
A legend among college basketball fans, Packer worked as a color commentator at 34 Final Fours for CBS and NBC between 1975 and 2008.
“He really enjoyed doing the Final Fours,” Mark Packer told the Associated Press. “He timed it right. Everything in life is about timing. The ability to get involved in something that, frankly, he was going to watch anyway, was a joy to him. And then college basketball just sort of took off with Magic Johnson and Larry Bird and that became, I think, the catalyst for college basketball fans to just go crazy with March Madness.”
After playing for Wake Forest between 1958 and 1962, Packer began his broadcasting career which would ultimately coincide with the rapid growth of college basketball.
He joined NBC in 1974 and called his first Final Four in 1975. UCLA beat Kentucky to win the national championship that season in what would be legendary UCLA coach John Wooden’s final game.
Packer was on the call in 1979 with Dick Enberg and Al McGuire when Magic Johnson’s Michigan State team beat Larry Bird’s Indiana State squad in the title game, an event that is often credited with spurring the popularity of college hoops.
The matchup between future Hall of Famers remains the highest-rated game in basketball history with a 24.1 Nielsen rating, which is an estimated 35.1 million viewers.
Packer joined CBS in the fall of 1981 when the network acquired the rights to the NCAA Tournament. He remained the network’s main analyst until the 2008 Final Four.
He called his final game alongside Jim Nantz when Kansas beat Memphis in San Antonio. Several prominant basketball figures, including ESPN broadcasting legend Dick Vitale, took to Twitter to express their condolences and share memories of Packer.
Vitale said Packer had “a great passion fo college basketball” and that he, along with Enberg and McGuire “were super.”
“Billy Packer was synonymous with college basketball for three decades and set the standard of excellence as the voice of the NCAA men’s basketball tournament,” CBS Sports Chairman Sean McManus said in a statement.
“He had a tremendous impact on the growth and popularity of the sport. In true Billy fashion, he analyzed the game with his own unique style, perspective and opinions, yet always kept the game as the focus. As passionate as he was about basketball, at his heart Billy was a family man. He leaves part of his legacy at CBS Sports, across college basketball and most importantly, as a beloved husband, father and grandfather. He will be deeply missed by all.”
Packer received a Sports Emmy for Outstanding Sports Personality, Studio and Sports Analyst in 1993. He was inducted into the National Collegiate Basketball Hall of Fame in 2008.
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