Awesome Baby! Lakewood Ranch's Dick Vitale's says he is cancer free
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SARASOTA — On the scoreboard of life, cancer his opponent, Dick Vitale has taken the lead.
And the Lakewood Ranch resident and ESPN college basketball analyst does not intend to relinquish it.
Via Twitter, the 82-year-old Vitale tweeted that he is free of the lymphoma he’s battled since October. He received the news from his doctors after a scan taken on Tuesday.
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“OMG ALL THE PRAYERS many of u have sent have been answered as DR Brown who heads my cancer TEAM called & said PET SCAN came back that NO CANCER is showing,” Vitale tweeted. “I feel like a coach playing for the Final 4 has a PTPer hit a shot at buzzer. My MARCH MADNESS starts with a W baby?”
Though tests revealed no cancer cells in his body, "(I) still must do a couple more chemo treatments to make certain all the cancer cells are gone,” Vitale texted to the Sarasota Herald-Tribune, “even though a pet scan showed no cancer.”
Vitale’s lymphoma diagnosis came months after he was found to have melanoma. Surgery removed it, but in January, he announced he would have to step away from the ESPN microphone to rest his voice before surgery on his vocal cords to treat dysplasia. Treatment for Vitale’s lymphoma included steroids and six months of chemotherapy.
On Saturday, Vitale will accompany two of his doctors to Amalie Arena in Tampa for the semifinals of the SEC Tournament, where he will be honored by the conference. It will be the first game Vitale attends since broadcasting in November a game between Gonzaga and UCLA.
And with Vitale's Gala scheduled for May, Thursday will be the first-ever Giving Day. A donor will make a $100,000 donation in Vitale's name to the V Foundation for Cancer Research, then will match any donations made by the general public, up to $100,000. To donate, visit v.org/givingday.
Former Rutgers University basketball player Michael MacDonald and his wife, Jean, have made a contribution of $2 million to the V Foundation. Of that, $1 million will go to the Vitale Pediatric Cancer Fund in Vitale's honor. MacDonald played for Vitale in 1971 on the Rutgers varsity team, Vitale's first collegiate coaching job.
This article originally appeared on Sarasota Herald-Tribune: Awesome Baby! Lakewood Ranch's Dick Vitale's says he is cancer free
