NBC Sports is bringing back many of the broadcasters associated with its 1990s-era NBA package for a special “throwback” game Tuesday night.
Bob Costas will call Tuesday’s Spurs-Sixers NBA regular season game for NBC alongside analysts Doug Collins and Mike Fratello, with Jim Gray on the sidelines, NBC Sports announced Tuesday. In studio, ESPN’s Hannah Storm and P.J. Carlesimo will join Isiah Thomas on the “NBA Showtime” pregame show.
Costas, who retired from play-by-play at the end of the 2024 Major League Baseball season, had hinted at the ‘throwback’ broadcast in his recent appearance on the Sports Media Watch Podcast. “They’re talking about having a throwback game, or throwback games, where people associated previously with the NBA on NBC might make a cameo appearance.” It will be his first NBA play-by-play assignment since the 2002 playoffs, when he filled in on some games after Marv Albert was injured in a car accident.
All seven broadcasters were part of the previous iteration of the “NBA on NBC” in the 1990s. Costas, who returned to NBC in an emeritus role earlier this year, served as a studio host and/or play-by-play voice at least once in all 12 seasons the network carried the league from 1990-2002. Storm started out as a sideline reporter before replacing Costas as lead studio host from 1997-2000, a role she shared with Ahmad Rashad in 2001-02.
Fratello was NBC’s lead game analyst from 1990-93, later returning to NBC as a studio analyst after a run coaching the Cleveland Cavaliers. Thomas was a lead analyst in the 1997-98 season, eventually working with Collins and Costas in a three-man booth on the 1998 NBA Finals — the most-watched in league history. He shifted to the studio the next two seasons, while Collins remained the solo lead analyst from 1999-2001.
Gray, who also worked NBA games for CBS, roamed the sidelines for NBC from 1994-2002. Carlesimo was part of the pregame cast for one season in 2000-01 before shifting to secondary game analyst team in 2001-02.
In addition to bringing back former on-air talent, NBC will also use graphics reminiscent of those from the 1995-96 NBA season.
In its first season airing NBA games since the 2001-02, NBC has repeatedly tapped voices from its prior run. In addition to Costas’ return, NBC has aired pregame teases voiced by Albert and Tom Hammond. Game broadcasts also feature the AI-generated recreation of voiceover artist Jim Fagan, who died in 2017.
In another notable wrinkle, “Sunday Night Football” director Drew Esocoff will direct, marking his first NBA assignment since he left ABC for the “SNF” job in 2006. Esocoff’s return is not part of the ‘throwback’ effort — the timing is coincidental — and instead marks the beginning of a regular role on NBA games this season.
