Famed ESPN broadcaster Dick Vitale is facing another battle with cancer.
Vitale mentioned Monday that biopsy outcomes had confirmed a prognosis of melanoma in his lung and liver cavity, which may have him beginning immunotherapy. It marks his fifth battle with cancer, which sidelined him from the airwaves for 2 years earlier than his return shortly earlier than March Madness in 2025.
“I’ve beaten melanoma,” the 86-year-old Vitale mentioned in a statement released by ESPN. “I’ve beaten lymphoma. I’ve beaten vocal-cord cancer. I’ve beaten lymph-node cancer. I’m 4 for 4 and I’m fully confident I’m going to make it 5 for 5.”
Separate from his ESPN assertion, Vitale posted on social media Monday that he had gone by way of 10 days of testing that included scans, MRIs, bloodwork and a biopsy.
“I obviously did not get the report today that I was hoping for when my oncologist called,” Vitale mentioned, noting he deliberate on “winning the battle” and including: “Now at least I know what I face.”
Vitale has made himself a fixture in college basketball, incomes the affectionate nickname “Dickie V” with his voice and exuberant fashion providing a soundtrack to a few of the largest moments within the sport’s historical past. He’s inching nearer to 5 many years with ESPN going again to its 1979 launch, armed with a contract by way of the 2027-28 season in addition to the creation of a basketball occasion named in his honor this previous season.
And each step of the way in which he’s fast to inform anybody and everybody how “lucky” he feels to nonetheless be working after years of preventing cancer.
That began in 2021 with melanoma, adopted by therapies for lymphoma. There have been additionally chemotherapy therapies, radiation for vocal-cord cancer and surgical procedure by summer season 2024 to take away cancerous lymph nodes from his neck, whereas he was unable to talk for a time after the vocal-cord surgical procedure, leaving him having to scribble on eraser-board messages to speak.
Still, Vitale mentioned in his ESPN assertion that he feels “fantastic.” And he shortly turned the main focus of his assertion to his long-running efforts to lift cash for pediatric cancer analysis, notably with subsequent month’s annual gala in his title that has raised greater than $105 million in its two-decade historical past.
“At 86 years young, I’ve lived a hell of a life, and I’m more motivated than ever to raise money for kids battling cancer,” Vitale mentioned, including that he hopes to lift $12 million with the twenty first “Dick Vitale Gala” set for May 1 in Sarasota, Florida.