Gus Johnson Could Make Curling Fun to Watch

I know this weekend is all about the NFL Playoffs, but I’d be remiss if I didn’t acknowledge that there were other sports being played. In fact, there was a lot of college hoops going on. And while I’m certainly not ready to tune in for regular season NCAA basketball on a consistent basis quite yet, once in awhile you get pulled into a game. Saturday’s Kentucky/Vandy game was one of those times. The reason was simple: Gus Johnson.

As a Knicks fan, I’ve grown accustomed to enjoying Gus on the rare occasions I subject myself to listening to the team on radio (which nowadays is the true definition of torture). Simply put, Gus is one of my favorite sportscasters. This weekend was just another example. In an otherwise poorly-played, albeit competitive second half at Rupp Arena, I tuned in to CBS with about five minutes left in regulation. Gus wouldn’t let me change the channel after that point.

If you were tuning into the game without context, one could easily have been convinced this was an elite eight game in the NCAA tournament. The excitement level from Gus off-the-charts when this guy is doing the play-by-play. And it’s a natural (read: not Dickie V.) type of enthusiasm. The guy loves what he does and it comes through. He does what a good play-by-play guy is supposed to do…accurately describe what’s happening on the court while infusing the emotion of the game, the players and the environment…in short, make us feel like we are there. Get our juices flowing about something we otherwise would have little to no interest in.

Aside from mentioning maybe a hundred times that this could be Billy Gillipsie’s “signature” win at UK, Gus was otherwise wildly entertaining. Every time I was tempted to channel surf it was as if the man himself was screaming “how can you leave this game!” “SEC action at its finest!” “And…we’re going to double overtime!”

He sucked me in and didn’t let go. Gus reminded this fan why he should be calling games with Raf for every big-time college basketball showdown this season and come March. The folks at Awful Announcing, with whom we agree approximately 95% of the time, have countless times sung Gus’s praises, and we second the motion.

As for the game, you could have officially closed the book on the Wildcats season if they had fallen at home after being up 16 at one point in the second half and failing to shut the door in overtime despite ample opportunity. Time will tell, but the gap between 6-8 and opening up the season with a mentally-crushing loss in-conference to drop your seventh in the last nine…and getting back to .500 with a double-overtime win over a previously undefeated Vandy team to open up the SEC schedule seems ENORMOUS.

Personally, I still don’t think this Wildcats team is very good, and it has nothing to do with the coach. That said, the next three games will surely show us a whole lot about the 07-08 Kentucky Wildcats. They play two on the road against Mississippi State and Florida before coming home to face Tennessee. If Billy G. can even win two of those three, the folks in Lexington should give him a break for awhile. And by “awhile” we’re thinking about a week?