Joe Starkey, the longtime Cal radio broadcaster greatest identified for letting the world know that “The band is out on the sector” from the 1982 Stanford-Cal sport, introduced on Thursday that 2022 shall be his closing 12 months.
It would conclude a virtually five-decade long term because the Voice of Golden Bears soccer for one of many Bay Space’s legendary sports activities broadcasters, who additionally was the radio voice of the San Francisco 49ers 20 seasons and a long term as sports activities director at KGO-AM. Starkey, 80, was additionally the primary broadcaster for the Bay Space’s two hockey groups, the Oakland/California Golden Seals and the San Jose Sharks.
However it’s his name for “The Play” that has stood the take a look at of time and continues to be remembered 40 years later. After declaring that Stanford’s band is on the sector earlier than Cal’s Kevin Moen ran a member of the Stanford band over whereas scoring the game-winning landing, a breathless Starkey mentioned the play was, “essentially the most superb, sensational, dramatic, heartrending, thrilling, thrilling end within the historical past of school soccer.”
This 12 months’s Large Recreation is scheduled to happen on Nov. 19 in Berkeley — at some point in need of the 40-year anniversary of “The Play” from Nov. 20, 1982. It will likely be Starkey’s penultimate common season sport, and Cal introduced that they'll host “Joe Starkey Day” for his or her common season finale this season towards UCLA.
“It has been an unimaginable privilege to have the perfect seat in the home to observe Cal soccer since 1975,” Starkey mentioned in a press release. “My first place in sportscasting was in 1972, and I've had some actually particular assignments. However of all of the locations I've labored, the one fixed has been Cal soccer. I can’t start to thank all the Cal gamers, coaches, employees and professors who've made this fairy story journey so extremely satisfying. The College of California is a really particular place and I couldn’t be prouder to have made no less than a small contribution of pleasure to this iconic tutorial establishment.”
Cal head coach Justin Wilcox added, “What an unimaginable profession Joe Starkey has had over such an extended time period. Joe’s identify is synonymous with the historical past of our soccer program. It’s going to be a thrill to see him honored and acknowledged by so many who've loved his work through the years.”
Along with his work at Cal, Starkey spent two seasons working as the colour commentator on 49ers video games alongside Lon Simmons earlier than taking up the play-by-play duties in 1989. Over his 20-year run with the crimson and gold, Starkey was the radio voice for a number of the most well-known moments in 49ers historical past, with explicit love confirmed to his name of The Catch II — the place he repeatedly exclaimed Terrell Owens’ final identify after the huge receiver’s catch to beat the Inexperienced Packers within the 1998 Wild Card spherical.