The 2014 Sochi Olympics and the ensuing Russian doping scandal. The Patriots’ comeback win over the Seahawks in Super Bowl XLIX. Golden State’s dynasty-starting championship win over the Cavaliers in the 2015 NBA Finals.
Like most of us, Mike Tirico watched the first two as a spectator. He called those NBA Finals for ESPN Radio. A mainstay at ESPN for over two decades, the Syracuse alum had since worked his way into becoming one of the most respected play-by-play announcers around, but some of the biggest sporting events and platforms in the world remained out of reach.
Not that Tirico, the Syracuse student, would have complained. He’s already surpassed the expectations he had in the late 1980s as he prepared to become a sports broadcaster.
“Can I get a job in local TV or perhaps get a job as the voice of a team somewhere down the line?” Tirico wondered. “Which was really what I thought would be the best possible scenario, professionally, for me.”
After surpassing those expectations during his memorable ESPN tenure, which included serving as the voice of Monday Night Football and calling The Open, The Masters, the FIFA World Cup, and Wimbledon, Tirico made the move to NBC Sports, and boy, what a difference a decade makes.
Now, in 2025, already the voice of Sunday Night Football, he prepares to host NBC’s primetime coverage of the 2026 Milan Cortina Olympics (his fifth stint doing so), be the lead voice of their NBA coverage this season, and finally call The Big Game when NBC broadcasts Super Bowl LX in February.
“The Super Bowl certainly will feel like a milestone achieved or reached, maybe. That hits you differently because… I mean, that’s beyond your wildest dreams,” Tirico told Awful Announcing. “Dreaming of the Super Bowl, it seems ridiculous because that will never happen, right?”
What makes Tirico’s 10th year with NBC Sports that much more special is how, at least to the outside world, it sometimes felt like this kind of culmination might never come.
Arriving at NBC Sports in 2016, Tirico found himself waiting in line behind two titans of the industry. Bob Costas commanded the Olympics hosting chair, amongst many other roles, while Al Michaels was the voice of NBC’s Sunday Night Football coverage. When NBC acquired the rights to Thursday Night Football, it was assumed that Tirico would slide into that chair, but the NFL initially pulled rank and demanded Michaels get the nod.
“I thought I was going to be doing the Thursday games, but still, to this day, I don’t know how it all played out. But NBC was great about it,” said Tirico. “As a matter of fact, it became one of the best things that ever happened for me because it allowed me to do the Notre Dame games.”
Along with calling the Fighting Irish, Tirico was able to check off a few other dream opportunities, including hosting NBC’s Triple Crown horse racing, Indianapolis 500 coverage, and U.S. Open and Open Championship.
Rory McIlroy talks with NBC commentator Mike Tirico after winning the TOUR Championship golf tournament.
Credit: Adam Hagy-USA TODAY Sports
It also didn’t take long for cooler heads to prevail, and Tirico was officially named TNF’s play-by-play announcer, also working some SNF games. From the outside, it had appeared to be a frustrating situation that might have led him to reconsider his decision to leave ESPN. But as he puts it, that patience paid off, and it worked out even better than expected.
“What was supposed to be was just the Thursdays; it didn’t turn out to be that,” Tirico said. “The pivot to Notre Dame ended up being life-impactful for me, and I still got the chance to do games on Thursdays and Sundays with Cris [Collinsworth]… The whole thing could not have worked out better. I’m glad it did, because otherwise, I wouldn’t have had that Notre Dame experience that I cherish to this day.”
After TNF left for Fox, Tirico slid into the studio host role for Football Night in America and officially took over as the primetime host of NBC’s Olympics coverage in PyeongChang, a role he considers “the assignment of a lifetime.”
“There is nothing like the Olympic Games in size, scope, stature,” he said. “The NBC Olympic family has become really a part of our lives since I’ve been there. You’re almost always in Olympic mode, right? Because you’re two years away from another Games, then two years away from another Games.”
Mike Tirico arrives on the red carpet before the Opening Ceremony for the Paris 2024 Olympic Summer Games along the Seine River.
Credit: James Lang-USA TODAY Sports
From there, Tirico’s ascent to the top of the sports broadcasting mountain really took shape. In 2022, he pulled double-duty, hosting both NBC’s Beijing Olympics coverage and the Super Bowl LVI pregame show in Los Angeles. That year, he was finally named the voice of Sunday Night Football. Very few broadcasters get the opportunity to replace a legend, and Tirico had almost quietly assumed the space left behind by two, not only keeping the ship afloat but also making the broadcasts his own.
That success comes from the thing that inspired him to consider joining NBC in the first place.
“Storytelling was important,” he said. “It was something NBC always did well and something that really appealed to me.”
Ten years on, whatever concerns anyone might have had about Tirico’s role with NBC have vanished. And as he prepares for a stretch that will include some of the biggest NBA games of the season, the Winter Olympics, and calling a Super Bowl, the 58-year-old is doing his best not to see it as a culmination. Instead, it’s one more chapter in a story that’s still got a long way to go.
“I don’t think it’ll feel like, ‘Boy, this is the culmination of my time here,’ because hopefully, there’s so much more ahead,” said Tirico. “The day in LA, where I hosted the Super Bowl pregame and then did the trophy presentation and then hosted the Olympics right after, that was pretty crazy. That was something that I’ll never forget. And I assume that this February will feel very similar to that.
“That stretch, especially that Super Bowl Sunday, I think this is where it will feel like that. They’ve even bumped up a little bit because [I’m] calling the game this time, and the NBA being a part of our lives at that point as well.”
Where does Mike Tirico go from here? He’s running out of boxes to check (including guest-hosting Today). But that, in and of itself, is quite an accomplishment. The student broadcaster who once dreamed of securing a job with a local TV station was inducted into the National Sports Media Association’s Hall of Fame a few months ago. To hear him tell it, he’s just getting started, and there’s no place he’d rather be.
“There’s just an energy, the juice that has just been increasing in these last 10 years that I’ve been here. And that’s what’s made it such a great move and a great time,” he said. “I still have so many friends at ESPN and root for my friends who are still there and want to see them do well and respect the heck out of what they do. But this has become home really quickly and feels like it’s been home for a lifetime, even though it’s just Year 10 for me here.”