Jim Nantz’s parting thoughts on the game he loves and what’s been “the real joy of it”

The men’s NCAA championship game will be a battle between San Diego State and the University of Connecticut. But tonight’s title game isn’t the only final. After more than three decades calling college basketball, longtime CBS Sports play-by-play announcer Jim Nantz is saying goodbye to the sport.

Tonight in Houston Nantz will call his final NCAA championship game.

CBS Sports play-by-play announcer Jim Nantz. CBS News

He remembered when he first broadcast the Final Four back in 1991: “And someone said, ‘Do you think you’ll ever have a chance to approach the all-time record for most championship calls, play-by-play?’ I said, ‘What’s the record?’ And I was told six. I’m about to call my 32nd.”

“You kind of blew that out of the water,” said “CBS Saturday Morning” co-host Dana Jacobson.

“Don’t feel sorry for me,” said Nantz. “It just gives you a little context of how long it’s been. It’s pretty amazing!”

Just as Nantz has left his mark, the game – and, more notably, the players – have left theirs, forever intertwined by “March Madness.”

“I love to talk to the kids and the coaches. And that’s, to me, been the real joy of it,” he said. “I will miss that a lot.”

One connection that stands out among the rest was forged with a young player at Duke in the early ’90s, Grant Hill.

“Grant was the star of the first championship game I ever called in ’91,” Nantz said. “We struck a friendship when Grant was a freshman at Duke. I can still recall being introduced to the players, and after practice he challenged me to a game of Horse. So, we used to play Horse. Maybe I could get a letter on him! I never did that with any other player.”

He said he told Hill he looked forward to hopefully their paths crossing again somewhere down the road. “And they did, starting in 2015, sitting by my side.”

CBS Sports commentators Bill Raftery, Grant Hill and Jim Nantz working the 2019 NCAA Final Four semifinal between Auburn and Virginia, at U.S. Bank Stadium in Minneapolis, April 6, 2019. Streeter Lecka/Getty Images

Nantz has had a front row seat to “March Madness” history with a number of legendary analysts, like Bill Raftery, Clark Kellogg, and the late Billy Packer, who died in January. “Billy and I called 18 Final Fours together,” said Nantz. “I really wanted him to be in Houston because I have felt like I’ve been carrying his baton, the torch. And he missed by a couple of months.”

And while Nantz’s teammates may have changed over the years, the team at CBS Sports has not.

“It’s not about what’s on the back of the jersey, it’s what’s on the front of the jersey,” Nantz said. “We don’t have names on the back of our blue blazers, but we have an eyepatch – the blue blazer and the CBS eyepatch. That’s the front of our uniform. And it has been a joy and a true privilege to wear it all these years.”

Jacobson asked, “Why this year? Why did you decide it was time?”

“I have been blessed beyond belief, between the NFL and the PGA Tour and college basketball,” he said. “However, there’s this other part of your life, the really most important part, where you want to be the best dad of all time. So, I need more windows to be able to be the all-pro dad that I would like to be. And I’m ready to sit back and enjoy the tournament as a fan.”

“What do you think that will be like?”

“I hope that I’ll have a tiny role only at the Final Four,” he said. “I would like to sit in the stands. I’d like to have an earpiece so I can listen to the broadcast. When the game ends and the confetti is in the air, I will turn to my children, and I want to be able to just say, ‘Excuse me, Daddy will be right back.’ And I run onto the floor, give the trophy away, and then come back to my seat to watch on the big screens ‘One Shining Moment’ as another tournament comes to a close.”

Jacobson asked Nantz, “Do you think you’re leaving the game of basketball better than you found it?”

“I don’t know that I’ve made the game better, I know it’s made me better,” Nantz replied. “I know having that seat has been one of the most cherished things in my life. And I always say the same thing: I long for nothing. I’m grateful for everything.”

Watch CBS’ live coverage of the NCAA men’s championship game between the University of Connecticut and San Diego State Monday, April 3 on CBS and Paramount+ beginning at 8:30 p.m. ET. 

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Dana Jacobson is a co-host of “CBS Saturday Morning.”