Ian Eagle has taken the reins as the new voice of March Madness. Though fans miss Jim Nantz, Eagle has seamlessly filled the role. He’ll be calling Monday night’s championship between UConn and Purdue alongside familiar faces Grant Hill and Bill Raftery.
And speaking of familiarity, it hasn’t taken long for Eagle to grow familiar with Raftery and Hill. Eagle has previously worked with the ever-so-jolly Raftery, whose iconic “onions” have become a March Madness rallying cry, but to fully immerse yourself in a broadcast team that head Nantz was at the helm of for so many years and not miss a beat, well that’s just speaks to Eagle’s greatness.
The comfortability over the months of March and April has grown so much that Eagle is now doing impressions of Raftery. And he gave an iconic impersonation of Raftery’s classic calls of “Onions,” “Get the puppies set,” and “Ohh — a nickel-dimer.”
“I do a better Raft than Raft,” Eagle said.
“I do a better Raft than Raft.” – Ian Eagle 😂 pic.twitter.com/1C7orsqbBR
— CBS Sports (@CBSSports) April 8, 2024
That saw Raftery do an impression of him doing an impression of Eagle doing an impression of him. They were doing a New Jersey (now Brooklyn) Nets game years ago, and Eagle took hold of the replay and made sounds that were akin to Mickey Mouse.
“And the other producer goes, ‘Great job, Bill,” recalled Raftery. “And with that, Bird goes ‘That was me. That was me.'”
And who knows, perhaps Eagle can do some Raftery impressions on Monday as the play-by-play voice and company look to guide us to another unforgettable championship game.
[CBS Sports on X]
About Sam Neumann
Since the beginning of 2023, Sam has been a staff writer for Awful Announcing and The Comeback. A 2021 graduate of Temple University, Sam is a Charlotte native, who currently calls Greenville, South Carolina his home. He also has a love/hate relationship with the New York Mets and Jets.