Sports

After all these years, Vitale gets his first shot at Final Four

Two coaching legends will be part of the Final Four this weekend with Jim Boeheim’s Syracuse team going against Michigan and Rick Pitino’s Louisville squad taking on Cinderella Wichita State.

Another college basketball mainstay, perhaps just as famous as the pair mentioned above, will be making his first working appearance at the Final Four this weekend. Dick Vitale will get to call his first Final Four games for ESPN International tomorrow, doing the first game between Louisville and Wichita State and then Monday’s championship game alongside Brad Nessler.

Vitale has spent 30 years in the ESPN booth, but has never called an NCAA Tournament game with the cable network only briefly owning the rights to earlyround games.

“I know people have always said to me, ‘I wish you could do an NCAA Tournament game’. But I never really allowed it to be a dilemma. I’ve always believed never to be worried about things you can’t do. But I am excited obviously to sit courtside, see the two teams play for the big, big prize will be special,” Vitale said of the games that will be broadcast to over 150 countries.

It’s not for a lack of effort on CBS’s part. CBS tried to rent Vitale on several occasions— most recently in 2006 — to be part of its NCAA Tournament coverage, but was rebuffed by ESPN each time. Vitale said he never held a grudge against ESPN and never considered jumping networks to CBS fulltime.

“I always thought it was a nice gesture on their part to do some games, but my boss at ESPN, John Skipper, called me up and said, ‘I hope you understand we are not going to allow it. Don’t be angry,’ ” Vitale said.

“I wasn’t angry I was honored that my network wanted me to be exclusive with them. … It is a joy for me that I am going to add it to my resume now.”

Vitale’s first Final Four includes an interesting mix of teams with Syracuse battling back after struggling at the end of the regular season. Michigan reaching the Final Four thanks to a miracle comeback against Kansas. Louisville is going from oddson favorite to fan favorite with the gruesome injury Kevin Ware suffered in its Elite Eight win over Duke. And Wichita State trying to shock the Cardinals and the rest of the world by finishing off its incredible run with two more wins.

Vitale dreamed of coaching in the Final Four himself. In eight years — between 1970 and 1978—he went from a sixth grade basketball coach in New Jersey to head coach of the Pistons. In between he also had stops at Rutgers and the University of Detroit. When he was coaching the Titans, he met Scotty Connal, who would soon become president of ESPN and would remember Vitale from a pregame conversation. When Vitale was fired by the Pistons, Connal came calling.

“I was so depressed I was home watching Luke and Laura on ‘General Hospital.’ I was a mess, I was humiliated, going to church on Sundays and people looking at you, you feel like such a failure,” Vitale said. “ESPN gave me a life. I firmly believe if I had stayed in coaching — I’m 73, because losing tore my insides into shreds — I’d be dead at 50. Instead I get to live a great life, not the pressure I’ve had as a coach.”

jterranova@nypost.com