CHAPEL HILL, N.C. — In about 100 days, the world will turn its eyes to Paris for the 2024 Summer Olympics.

What You Need To Know

  • On Tuesday, the Olympic flame for the Summer Games in Paris will be lit in Olympia, Greece, the site of the Ancient Olympic Games

  • North Carolina native and UNC alum Jim Lampley has broadcast a record 14 Olympics on American television

  • Lampley moved back to North Carolina during the pandemic to teach a course at UNC-Chapel Hill but has taken a break from teaching

A familiar face and voice of Olympic broadcasts over the years is North Carolina native Jim Lampley. The UNC-Chapel Hill alum has covered a record 14 Olympic Games and countless memorable moments, including the 1980 “Miracle on Ice,” arguably the biggest upset in sports history.

“That game wound up showing on American television in tape delay,” said Lampley, who worked for ABC Sports at the time. “While the American audience was watching and learning the results, I was having dinner with Mike Eruzione, who scored the winning goal over the Russians.”

Lampley also found himself in the middle of a breaking news story during the 1996 Olympic Games in Atlanta. He was live on-air for NBC when a bomb went off in Centennial Park. The attack killed one person and injured over 100 others.

“Hannah Storm and I instantly went through the experience which sportscasters suddenly become newscasters,” Lampley remembered. “It took the network, NBC, several hours to locate Tom Brokaw, who was out having dinner.”

Many also remember Lampley from his 30-year run with HBO Boxing, where he was the voice of many of boxing’s biggest fights, from Mike Tyson to Lennox Lewis, Manny Pacquiao and Floyd Mayweather. It was a job he thought he’d work forever until HBO abruptly got out of the boxing business in 2018.

Return to North Carolina

In 2017, Lampley met former UNC Chancellor Kevin Guskiewicz at a fundraising luncheon in Los Angeles. The two became friends, and the seeds were planted for a potential return to his alma mater in a teaching capacity. With a lot more free time on his hands after the end of HBO Boxing, Lampley moved from California back to Chapel Hill to teach a communications class called “Evolution of Storytelling in American Electronic News Media” in the spring 2020 semester.

“Everybody thinks I want to teach something about sports. It wasn’t about sports,” Lampley said. “I went into teaching at UNC on the basis of doing a course that would be about curating and protecting the truth.”

A truth that Lampley believes has been threatened by social media. A reason he decided to teach was to counter what he sees as its destructive effects.

“What protected the truth was professional media. The first urge of social media is to alter the truth to something I want,” Lampley said. “And filtering through until I read the post from somebody who feels exactly the same way I do.”

In retrospect, Lampley says he felt like a one-man army and overestimated his ability to change people’s minds and break up their digital habits. Frustration that he wasn't getting through is a big reason why he hasn’t been in the classroom this year. Lampley decided to take a break from academia, though he’s not ruling out a return.

“A fair number of students will be impressed with what I say, but the instant they walk out of the classroom, the first thing they do is to pull out this instrument (smartphone) and go back to those media, which are feeding their perceptions and their instincts and reflexes every day,” Lampley said.

The 75-year-old still gets to talk boxing as a contributor to a digital media outfit called PPV.com.

He’s also devoting much of his attention to writing his own story. Lampley was approached about an autobiography. The publisher wants a draft by September 24.

“I think I’ll finish on September 23,” Lampley said.