Raleigh, NC – College Sports Landscape is developing, coming so fast with some changes, it is difficult to keep an eye on all Coming and Going. Among the TV networks, some traditions of the conference recurrence, indigo mobility and year-on-year roster turnover, personality, league and rivals have weakened.
In Rale, fans of the Neck State have taken rest in the familiar voice of Radio announcer Gary Han.
71 -year -old Han is undergoing his own infection. He recently lost his mother and plans to retire after 2023-24 basketball season.
Han arrived at Rale in 1990 and is one of the last men standing from the ACC Golden Age – when on Tuesday night the basketball game was still one of the main ships for entertainment in the region. In 2024, some triangular fans are left by a league that is no longer concentrated around the northern Carolina and reaches the West Coast far, thus promoting the “tobacco road” brand that enhances the pre-basketball-operated conference.
Han’s exit game is a small part of the huge changes in the media and in the college game.
Han has called over 420 football games (one missing in 2009 after surgery for prostate cancer) and more than 1,000 basketball games in 34 years behind MIC. His association with the state is as strong as Bob Harris was with Duke and with the heavenly Woody Durham with UNC-Chapel Hill. Harris retired in 2017 and Durham died a year later.
On Monday night against Han Duke, his final regular season home basketball game will be called. He announced his retirement in October and called his final football game in December.
Han spoke with Wral News about where the college games are going, they have covered their retirement plan and favorite NC state players.
Question: Do you have a lot of time to reflect it how it is?
A: I have not really spent a lot of time to think about it because I have a lot of other things. All this can kill me when it is over. I think it has been a good run – 34 years in one place. This is a blessing. Prabhu opened some incredible doors for me to come here 34 years ago, and he protected me when I am here.
Question: What do you do all the changes around college games like recurrence of conference, indigo and TV network deals that are making it a new experience for fans?
A: Cable in Cumberland, Maryland, we had cable TV and because of this, I was able to get the ACC Game of the Week with bones McKini and Jim Thacar in 1963. I started looking at him and immediately, I was bent. I really thought it was exciting stuff, and I loved playing basketball. So I got the taste of what ACC was before I was part of any ink, I was part of it. There has been a golden age, and I think the process of getting away from it began which was the expansion of the conference and recurrence of the conference. When there were only eight or nine teams, everyone used to play everyone twice, you knew that you are going to do hard games in some places. You knew that you are going to have a decent non-conference program, but even though you did not have one of them, you can make it by playing ACC basketball. It used to be that if you also had a record in ACC, you had a good chance to create NCAA tournaments. Now all this is different.
You cannot get away from change. This is going to happen, but I think the changes that are happening in college athletics now, I do not know how they are going to come out, but I am not in favor of some of them, and I will leave it on it.
Why: Ever since you are in Rale, who are your favorite three wolfpack football and basketball players?
A: I think one of my favorite football players was a person played in quarterbacks in the early 90s and then in a broad receiver. His name was Charles Devanport. He was a good man who was to live around. When you interviewed him, you made it right. He simply cuts loose, and he was very good and very good, a person.
I really like Tori Holt. He was the first boy there, he was the last to leave. He was just a great person – friendly, outgoing – I would say that I like tori hold very much.
Dantonio Burnette, which is now Shakti Coach, was the same as the same. He only told you that it was very favorable and outgoing. I always liked him.
I am probably leaving something out, because there are many good people who have played football in the state of NC which were very cooperative, sociable and outgoing and were not afraid of media. They knew that I was not to kick them in Butt, but usually to give them a positive spin on things. These people do not try to fail. They do not try to erupt football. They do not try to throw a blockage. They are trying their best. A lot of fans, I think, lose vision on it.
Basketball-wise, Tod Fulller will be one from the mid-90s. The thing about Tod is that he was an ideal student. He never got B. It was absolutely incredible. With the deadlines imposed on these people, he was just spectacular. I praised him a lot.
When I first came here, Chris Korchiani and Rodney were Monroe. The rodney was a little more reserved. Chris was a little more outgoing but I definitely liked him.
Tom Gugliotta was another basketball player who was reserved, but as I was now there and he got better, we actually hit it well.
The best person I was in college athletics is Mike O’Can. I talked to him this morning. He came to know that my mother died and he called me at home. Such a person is Mike O’Can.
Question: You called the Games for Louisville and Ohio State, which are big programs with assistant fan bases before coming to Rale. Do you know what you were doing when you came here as a college sports environment in 1990?
A: If you go to the Kentaki kingdom, there are many fans of Louisville and a lot of Kent fans, and it also matters there. If you go to Ohio, Ohio State-Machigan is a big deal with his rivals in Big Ten. When I came here, I had a great idea what a rivalry was. I was just eager for ACC basketball. Everywhere I was, everyone knew that ACC basketball was at a very high level. Even in Louisville, fan, I would not say jealousy, but they knew that ACC was there and perhaps the metro conference was not much. So if he used to play an ACC team and was able to defeat them, it was a big thing. I knew that ACC basketball was something special.
Question: 2022 You had a misunderstanding during Duke’s Mayo Bowl broadcast, which led to suspension. Was there any moment where you thought you would lose your job with a response? Was there self-confidence with him?
A: Everything I was trying to do was some irreversible humor, but I am going to say all this about it, because I have been asked not to comment. But I learned one thing.
I remember going back from the game and everyone in the car is deadly calm, no one wants to say anything. My phone is blowing with all this stuff. I just ‘friends, you can talk. I have taken a decision. I am going to fight my battle for me to Jesus Christ and whatever result is his wish. And I am calm with him. ‘I came to know for the next few weeks that 90 percent people love me. Ten percent hate my courage. 10 percent loved me every name and 90 percent in the book. The biggest thing I learned from him was the biggest thing. I never knew how people felt about me. I knew that they must have accepted me because I am still at that point, for 33 years. But I never really thought of how they feel about me as a person and how did I represent the university and all that. It turned out that something that most people would think is really a terrible, embarrassing moment, for me, a blessing came out.
Question: What are some consistent symptoms that you have tried to bring in every broadcast?
A: A good job is to be able to do a good job if the game is not good. I have always tried to do this, stay with facts and paint a picture with the audience, if they can close their eyes, they will know what is going on. It is difficult to do on radio and many people cannot do so. I think by the grace of God, I have been able to do so.
Question: Will you still follow NC State Sports closely in retirement?
A: I think I will still be a wolfpack fan. I care I don’t think you may be somewhere for 34 years and can know all the people I have to go and through all the players that have come through everything and there is no intimacy. You can’t do your back just like this. But for the next two years, I have to do a lot. I don’t think I am playing in a lot of charity golf tournaments.