“How Sweet It Is!”: Men’s Pancake Breakfast Jan 27, 8 am

Bob Harris Duke Today

By Susan Shinn Turner

“How sweet it is!”

That saying can always be used to describe the annual Men’s Pancake Breakfast — but even more so this year.

Special guest speaker is Bob Harris, three-time Sportscaster of the Year, and the voice of the Duke Blue Devils, who recently retired after 40 years with the university. The breakfast is set for 8 am Saturday, Jan. 27, in the fellowship hall.

Interestingly, Harris is a native of Albemarle, also the hometown of Woody Durham, the voice of the Tar Heels, and the two got their start at the same Stanly County radio station.

Harris broadcast from the NCAA tournament 35 times, including 13 Final Four appearances and five national championships. He’s been awarded the Order of the Long Leaf Pine, and has raised more than $2.5 million for Salute Our Troops.

“How sweet it is!” was Harris’ tagline after a Duke victory.

In 1976, Harris, who still lives in Durham, was working for WDNC and was asked to fill in for the color announcer at Duke. He stayed. Since then, he’s called 456 consecutive Duke football games and 1,358 consecutive Duke basketball games.

In Albemarle, Harris would sit in the stands at Little League games and call those games, says Tom Childress, who met Harris in 1969 when he was Pfeiffer’s basketball coach.

“He was just a sports nut and he came up through the ranks,” Childress says. “On Saturday mornings, he and I would do a sports talk radio show.”

Harris will talk about connecting his faith and life together, Childress says. “He’s just a salt-of-the-earth person. You won’t find anyone who doesn’t like Bob Harris.”

Who knows? The men might even get him to re-enact the call when Christian Laettner made the winning shot in the Duke vs. Kentucky game of 1992.

Gary Taylor, Men’s Ministry president, says that men of all ages are invited, and encourages everyone to bring a friend. The Monday Night Men’s Bible Study members are preparing the pancake breakfast.

“The breakfast is a good draw on a lot of levels,” he says. “A lot of men in the sports arena have quite a story to tell, so that’s a great drawing card. This is a wonderful outreach event for us. The more people we can get to St. John’s, the better off we are.”