Kevin Harlan

Super Bowl 58 was his 14th consecutive Super Bowl for Westwood One (Super Bowls XLV–LVII), the most consecutively in radio and television network history.

Kevin Robert Harlan (born June 21, 1960) is an American television and radio sports announcer.

Harlan graduated in 1982 with a broadcast journalism degree.

In 1982, right out of college, at age 22, Harlan became the TV and radio voice of the NBA's Kansas City Kings (now the Sacramento Kings).

He was then a basketball announcer for his alma mater, the University of Kansas, for one year, then went on to call games for the NFL's Kansas City Chiefs from 1985 to 1993 after several years hosting and producing surrounding pre-game and post-game programming while still in college.

Harlan also split time with the University of Missouri (1986–89) calling football and basketball games, and worked as the play-by-play voice of the NBA's Minnesota Timberwolves for nine seasons (1989–98).

On the network level, Harlan called NFL football for NBC in 1991, college football for ESPN in 1992–93, NFL for Fox from 1994 to 97–, and joined Turner Sports in 1996 to broadcast NBA playoff games (he would begin calling games throughout the entire season in 1997, which he continues to do to this day).

Harlan broadcast his first NBA All Star game for TNT in 2022, as well as the Western Conference Finals.

In addition, Harlan has called Jacksonville Jaguars, Chicago Bears, and Green Bay Packers preseason games; boxing for Mike Tyson vs. Buster Mathis Jr.. in 1995; basketball games during the now-defunct Goodwill Games, which were owned by Time Warner; college sports on ESPN; and several bowl games during college football seasons.

He began working for CBS in 1998 after four years at FOX.

Harlan also broadcast the CBS HD feed of Super Bowl XXXV in 2001.

He also calls the preseason games of his hometown Packers for the team's statewide television network since 2003.

He is one of three broadcasters to have more than 3,000 career national network broadcasts of the four major professional sports, along with Dick Stockton and Marv Albert.

Harlan began broadcasting as a teenager for his alma mater Our Lady of Premontre High School's high school radio station, WGBP-FM, calling play-by-play for the school's boys' basketball, football and ice hockey teams.

He was recently inducted into the school's Hall of Fame.

He was a ball boy with the Green Bay Packers in his teens during the time that his father, Bob Harlan, was a Packers executive in the front office.

He had originally pursued attending either the University of Wisconsin–Madison or the University of Notre Dame in pursuit of his communications/mass media degree, but a personal recommendation from broadcaster Gary Bender to his dad Bob led Kevin to instead attend the University of Kansas and its School of Journalism and Mass Communications.

Harlan was introduced to the Jayhawks' primary basketball play-by-play announcer at the time, Tom Hedrick, who noted Harlan's zeal for sports broadcasting and immediately considered him a protégé in the making.

Hedrick gave Harlan a sideline position his freshman year, eventually deeming him as his understudy and fill-in announcer on days when he had other commitments.

Harlan has also lent his voice on the NBA 2K video game series since 2005.

Until 2008, Harlan was the voice of Westwood One Radio's Final Four coverage of the NCAA Division I men's basketball tournament.

He is also the lead NFL radio voice nationally for Westwood One and Monday Night Football since 2009.

Overall, he is third all time in the total number of network television sports broadcasts doing play-by-play for one of the four major sports.

Harlan has also broadcast more than 500 NFL games on network TV, top 10 all time joining names like Al Michaels and Pat Summerall for play-by-play.

In 2009, he began serving as Westwood One's lead announcer for Monday Night Football, calling his first Super Bowl in Super Bowl XLV.

September 12, 2016 – Harlan was the radio play-by-play man for Westwood One's coverage of the Monday Night Football game between the San Francisco 49ers and the Los Angeles Rams, where a fan ran onto the field.

Harlan then proceeded to give a play-by-play of security chasing the man.

Deadspin referred to the call as an "All Timer".

"'Hey, somebody has run out on the field. Some goofball in a hat and a red shirt. Now he takes off the shirt! He’s running down the middle by the 50, he’s at the 30! He’s bare-chested and... BANGING HIS CHEST?! Now he runs the opposite way! He runs to the 50, he runs to the 40, the guy is DRUNK! But there he goes! The 20 — they’re chasing him, but they’re not going to get him! Waving his arms, bare-chested; Somebody stop that man! [Referring to the security] Oh, they got him, they’re coming from the left — Oh, and they tackle him at the 40-yard line! [Pause] Whew, that was the most exciting thing to happen tonight.'"

The son of former Green Bay Packers executive Bob Harlan, and a three-time National Sportscaster of the Year (2017, 2019, 2023), he broadcasts NFL and college basketball games on CBS and the NBA for TNT.

2023 is his 39th consecutive season doing NFL play-by-play, and 2023–24 is his 37th year doing NBA play-by-play.

He has broadcast 14 consecutive Super Bowls, the most in radio or television history.

In 2017, Harlan was voted by his peers as National Sportscaster of the Year by the NSMA.

He again was voted National Sportscaster of the Year by the NSMA in 2019.

He was also named 2019 National Sportscaster of the Year by The Athletic.

In September 2019 Harlan was inducted into the Notre Dame Academy High School Hall of Fame (the former Premontre HS he attended in Green Bay, Wisconsin).

Harlan has a history of injecting humor into situations during games whenever he can, in addition to being able to dramatize even mundane moments not related to the game itself.

These include:

November 4, 2019 – Harlan was the radio play-by-play for Westwood One's coverage of a Monday Night Football game between the Dallas Cowboys and New York Giants where a black cat ran onto the field midway in the second quarter.

"'Oh, there's a cat, a black cat has taken the field. A black cat is running from the 20 to the nearside, the 10, from the 39 of Dallas here is a short throw down the middle caught by Engram. Caught at the 35 to the 30, now the cat running the other way and so is Engram at the 25 near the 24 yard line of the Dallas Cowboys. It's a catch-run of 15. Now the cat is stopped at the 50. (Kurt Warner: So is it bad luck for the Giants, or bad luck for the Cowboys?) I don't know, I don't know but they've stopped play, and the players with hands on hips are watching the cat run and zig zag all over the field. The black cat is on the other end of the field. He's at the eight! (Warner: The cat doesn't know that it was last Thursday that was Halloween, Thursday Night Football, not Monday Night Football.) He's a little bit late. (Warner chuckles) Now he is sitting, and looking, now he's at the five... (Warner: Who brought the cat?) He's walking to the three, he's at the two... and the cat is in the CDW Red Zone, CDW, people who get it- Now a policeman, state troopers come on the field- AND THE CAT RUNS IN THE END ZONE!