Inside ESPN’S historic broadcast of Nuggets-mavs game
The lunchtime production meeting for ESPN’S Nuggets-dallas Mavericks broadcast March 11 began with a faint hope that the evening’s telecast would be normal.
Typically, a postseason chase featuring a clash of international superstars would provide excellent pregame discussion points. But the meeting, which included announcers Doris Burke, Ryan Ruocco and Tom Rinaldi, producer Ian Gruca and director Jeff
Evers, quickly shifted to address the implications of COVID-19.
“Within three minutes of the conversation, we were like, ‘This doesn’t feel right,’ ” recalled Evers. “‘We can’t talk about this.’ You could kind of feel that something was in the air.”
No one knew that their broadcast would be the last time anyone saw NBA basketball for the foreseeable future.
News had spread that day that the Golden State Warriors were preparing to play games without fans, which marked a monumental first step for the NBA. Ruocco recalled that several college conferences at that point planned to play their basketball tournaments without fans. Everyone awaited word from a Board of Governors phone call between the NBA’S owners and commissioner Adam Silver.
“There was like little pieces of news that came out, and there was just this eerie feeling like there was going to be an avalanche of change to our sports world and just to our daily lives, and you could feel that and you could sense it was coming,”
Ruocco said.
Evers said he and his team discussed contingencies and prepared as best they could for the unexpected. It reminded him more of a news gathering outfit than one preparing to show an NBA game. Once the broadcast began, instinct told him to look for shots that would convey how surreal the environment was.
The opening segment showed fans receiving hand sanitizer upon entering the American Airlines Center, Nuggets point guard P.J. Dozier trading an autograph for a squirt of sanitizer himself and Dallas owner Mark Cuban elbow bumping a Mavs supporter. The visuals portrayed the unease within the arena that night.
From there, Ruocco and Burke tread a delicate balance of handling the game in front of them while contextualizing the news that had engulfed the rest of the league. During the second quarter of the broadcast, the Oklahoma City-utah game was postponed, and news leaked that Jazz center Rudy Gobert had tested positive for the coronavirus. ESPN’S broadcast supplemented that report with halftime analysis from Scott Van Pelt. But the game was less than five minutes into the third quarter when the NBA announced its landmark decision to suspend the season indefinitely.
“What is an incredible luxury in those moments for the playby-play guy is when you are working with people who have a ridiculously high EQ (emotional quotient),” Ruocco said. “You can’t find people better than Doris Burke and Tom Rinaldi. To have the trust that, ‘Hey, they’re going to hit all the right notes as they give their perspective on this’ is the ultimate luxury for a play-by-play guy trying to navigate that.
“They also are universally respected,” he said. “They both have this very poignant, calm way of delivering messages. They were just the perfect people to be doing that broadcast with, because I knew they would bring the exact right perspective and emotion to whatever I was going to bring up or throw at them. And, they also are great at initiating conversation as well. They’re not going to just oop the alley that I throw up, they’re going to start the fast break as well.”
Meanwhile, back in the production truck, Evers directed a camera on Cuban knowing that he was bound to see news of the NBA’S suspension. That bet yielded when a camera caught Cuban’s jaw dropping as he stared at his phone.
The next thought he had was to try to get Cuban to speak on camera. The problem, however, was that the NBA had implemented rules for interviewing people at a safe distance, and the crew thought it would need a boom mic to follow protocol.
“But then Cuban came over to our table at that break to talk to Ryan and Doris, and Ian and I said to Doris, ‘Can you ask him if he’ll do an interview?’ ” Evers recalled. “And he said, ‘Of course.’ We kind of broke a little bit of the rule that was set up. It was understood. He understood the rule, he knew the rule. He was like, ‘I’ll do the interview, because I think it’s the right thing to do.’ ”
On air, Ruocco and Burke continued to weave in perspective from Rinaldi, Van Pelt and other ESPN reporters as they tried to provide a framework for what was an unprecedented night in NBA history. Even Burke, between her thoughtful commentary and measured analysis, admitted how difficult it was to concentrate.
By the end, as the Mavericks had pulled away in the fourth quarter, the camera cut to Burke and Ruocco to offer their final thoughts. Both struck a somber tone about the historic nature of the call.
“At the end of the game, our final on camera, Doris and I were both choked up,” Ruocco said. “If they had held the camera on us longer, you probably would’ve seen us crying. … I think also we were both so grateful to have each other. Doris and I are really, really, really close friends, and I think there was something almost beautiful in the appreciation we felt for each other in that moment, to say, ‘Man, this whole situation is awful. Thank God I had you to go through it with, and I’m proud of the way we handled it.’ ”
Burke would later test positive for the coronavirus. That Wednesday was the first day she had shown any symptoms. Ruocco said he has been in touch with Burke “almost every single day” since that game, and that “she’s doing great.” In the immediate aftermath, he said Burke checked in with everyone who she came into close contact with and alerted them of her diagnosis.
But that night, as the crew wound down from a stressful broadcast, she, Ruocco, Gruca, Evers and statistician Steve Lebow went back to the hotel, grabbed a drink and tried to process what had just happened.
“Sitting there, we were all just trying to put it in historic context,” Ruocco said. “We all knew this is going to be probably No. 1 on the list when our careers are done for nights you don’t forget.”