Sportscasters rehearse calling big moments over and over in their heads, but few ever get the chance to make a call that will echo through the years. CBS Sports' Verne Lundquist is one of the lucky ones, who, in a career spanning 50-plus years, has made some of the most memorable calls for a variety of sports from football to figure skating.
The key to those historic calls is a matter of balance, Lundquist tells Jim Axelrod in an interview for
CBS SUNDAY MORNING to be broadcast Sunday, March 26 (9:00 AM ET) on the
CBS Television Network.
"The challenge is to be appropriate to the moment," Lundquist says. "To not embellish the moment, to not overwhelm it."
Sunday, Lundquist will call the East Regional finals of the NCAA men's basketball tournament for
CBS Sports from Madison Square Garden, and in a few weeks he'll be at the Augusta National Golf Club to cover The Masters. During the past half-century, Lundquist, 76, has covered thousands of sporting events, and while he isn't done yet, he is cutting back his workload. Last December, he ended a 17-year-run calling Southeastern Conference
COLLEGE FOOTBALL games for CBS.
Lundquist was so beloved by fans he earned the nickname "Uncle Verne," and at each football game last fall the fans would salute him, something that touched him deeply. "I had to swallow hard and pinch my inner thigh to keep from crying," he tells Axelrod.
Lundquist talks with Axelrod about some of the thrilling highlights of his career, about his life away from sports, and how he and his wife Nancy share a love for symphonic music in the community they call home - Steamboat Springs, Colo.
"I am just so unbelievably appreciative of the way my career and my life have wound up," Lundquist says.
CBS SUNDAY MORNING is broadcast Sundays (9:00-10:30 AM ET) on the
CBS Television Network. Rand Morrison is the executive producer.
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CBS SUNDAY MORNING on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and CBSNews.com. Listen to
CBS SUNDAY MORNING podcasts at Play.it.
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