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In The Men's World
Burke's No-Nonsense Style Earns Respect

March 3, 2002
By LORI RILEY, Courant Staff Writer

Going into a television broadcast, Doris Burke is normally ultra-prepared. Ironically, the first time she worked a men's basketball game, she was completely unprepared.

It was a typical Saturday morning in the Burkes' Providence home. Doris' husband Gregg was in the basement lifting weights. Their 2-year-old son, Matthew, tagged along. Gregg had two hours before he had to report to work. He was an associate athletic director at Providence College; the Providence men's basketball team was playing Pitt that afternoon.

Gregg had just finished a set of situps when he heard a thud, followed by a scream. Matthew had fallen off a weight bench and had hit his head on the cement floor. There was blood. The Burkes ended up in the emergency room. Matthew had stitches, but was otherwise fine.

The Burkes were still a little shaken when they arrived home at 1 p.m. and found 16 messages on their answering machine from Gregg's colleagues waiting for him at the Providence Civic Center. There was an edge of panic in their voices.

"Hey, Gregg. Call us." "Gregg, where are you?" "Gregg, can you give me a call? Is Doris around?" "Gregg. We've got a situation here. Is Doris home?"

Gregg called. Only one TV announcer had shown up. "Doris has got to get down here," they told Gregg.

Doris had worked as an analyst for women's basketball games, but never men's.

"She was a wreck," Gregg said. "She's got blood all over her shirt. We call my parents, we're like, `We've got to get there now.' We both shower, we bomb down there, 55 minutes before the game, she hasn't prepared for either team. She visits the Pitt people for 10 minutes, the PC people for 10 minutes and they drag her out to do the opening.

"And," he added, "she nailed it. She nailed the game. I'm not just saying that because I'm married to her, either."

Said Doris: "I did it and it went very well. Though I hadn't prepared, I knew Providence, I knew Pittsburgh. I would've watched the game anyways."

Doris Burke, 36, is one of a handful of women who are TV analysts for men's basketball games. This year, she has been a mainstay on Big East men's games. Two years ago, she became the first woman to work on a Knicks broadcast, and three years ago, she was the first woman signed to do a men's conference package (Atlantic 10).

She signed an exclusive two-year contract with ESPN last April to cover 46 events, including men's and women's college basketball and WNBA games. She will be the analyst for the Big East women's championship game Tuesday (7:30 p.m., ESPN2).

Ask the men's coaches about her; they will dismiss her gender and speak admiringly of her work.

"It doesn't make a damn bit of difference [that she's a woman]," St. Joseph's coach Phil Martelli said. "She's hardworking. Always prepared. You knew when you talked to Doris, she was preparing to do a job, a very good job."

Said UConn coach Jim Calhoun: "She's one of the best analysts I've ever come into contact with.

"When she does your game, she's at your shoot-around the whole time and she always asks questions afterwards. She does her homework. I like her voice and presentation. It's wonderful."

Coaches and fans appreciate her no-nonsense style. Viewers will not find out whom she had dinner with the night before (probably Gregg and her two kids), what she did when she was a point guard at Providence (she was an All-Big East selection) or which WNBA general manager called her for her opinion on the draft (they do).

They will find out about the game.

She's the same way when the camera is off, too. Burke is low-key, blending a sense of humor with a dose of humility. It's hard to find anybody who doesn't like her or her style.

"Once, I went to a Christmas party and Dave Gavitt was there," Burke said. "I said to him, `I'm not sure if I have a personality that will make me successful in this industry. I mean, Dick Vitale - I can't do that.'

"Dave said to me, `Doris, there's not a single individual who's ever turned on the game to watch the announcers. But there are people who will turn the game off because of the announcers.' So I've tried to keep that in mind."

New Jersey Attitude

Doris Sable grew up in Manasquan, N.J. The park next door had a hoop. Her idols were Kentucky point guard Kyle Macy and fellow New Jerseyan Kelly Tripucka.

"A lot of tough players come out of Jersey," she said. "Tough-minded kids. That's what I was."

A point guard at Manasquan High, she attracted attention from UMass, Boston College, Boston University and Providence. She chose the Friars and was an All-Big East selection her senior year, 1987. She led the league in assists and she left Providence as the all-time career assist leader.

"The first time I ever laid eyes on her, I was at Holy Cross," said Gregg, who was the sports information director at the school at the time. "And I thought, `That's the dirtiest player I've ever seen in my life.' She was scratching and clawing and diving."

They were engaged on Valentine's Day 1989 and married seven months later. Doris was an assistant coach at Providence; Gregg worked in the athletic office.

They do a lot of things together. They can play golf together. They cannot play basketball.

"The last time we played, I think I threw the basketball at him and I walked out of one end of the gym and he walked out of the other," Doris said. "We can't play Scrabble. We can't play cards. We're both so competitive, it's ridiculous."

Said Gregg: "I've seen the woman drop an iron on her foot and not say a word. She hits a bad [golf] shot and I'm convinced she was raised by pirates.

"She's the most competitive person I've ever met in my life. She just carries it in a different way from anyone else I've ever seen. You'd be hard-pressed to find somebody in TV that has so many people that truly like her."

Moving On Up

Burke stopped coaching to start a family. Sarah, now 9, came first, then Matthew, who is 7. Her broadcasting career started with Providence women's basketball games on the radio.

"What station was it?" she said. "I don't know. I didn't pay attention to stuff like that. Honestly, who was listening?

"I loved it. I did. I remember my first game, I couldn't get the word `free throw' out. I was stuck on `free.' My strength is that I know the game so well. Whatever shortcomings I had because of lack of experience, I could always overcome those because the bottom line was, I knew the game."

Somebody missed a TV game and that was how Burke got her next break, stepping in to help out on a Providence women's game on NESN. Gregg told her she had to wear navy blue on TV. So she wore, she said, laughing, "the most God-awful blue dress you have ever seen in your life. It had a lace doily collar."

"`A Little House on the Prairie' schoolmarm dress," Gregg said.

Apparently nobody else had a problem with her attire or didn't notice. She was asked to do more women's games as the Big East TV package grew.

She worked for MSG and did color for the New York Liberty games. She worked for ESPN when the NCAA Tournament coverage and women's basketball coverage expanded. In 1999, the Atlantic 10 signed her as the primary analyst on its men's basketball package.

"She was, flat out, the best analyst," said Bob Steitz, associate commissioner for the A-10. "Initially there were some raised eyebrows. I don't think a lot of coaches had seen or heard her work. I told them, `At the end of the year, let's talk.' And they had nothing but glowing things to say about Doris."

In 2000, she became the first female color analyst on a Knicks game. Last year, ESPN signed her to an exclusive deal. The network would not reveal the terms.

"She immediately stood out," said Brian Sherriffe, a coordinating producer for ESPN for college basketball and the NBA. "She was very consistent in her delivery. She could do a quick interview in tough situations. The closest she reminds me of is Bill Raftery. She does have that burst of energy that Raf has always brought to the table. Some would be accused of being over the top, but Doris savors the moment. You know when you're at a big moment in the game with her."

Pam Ward worked with Burke for the first time at the 1997 women's regional final at Purdue.

"I was really new at play by play and she was terrific to work with," said Ward, an ESPN play-by-play announcer for women's basketball. "There were no problems with ego or stepping on each other."

Burke went the extra mile for Ward at a Duke women's game this season; Ward misplaced her makeup bag, so Burke handed over hers.

"She even let me use her lipstick," Ward said, laughing.

Family Woman

First and foremost, Burke is a mom. She never thought a career would come out of doing a few radio games; none of this was planned. She enjoys shuttling Matthew to karate and Sarah to swimming.

"I'll tell you what the hardest part of my job is," Doris said. "As I head out the door, every time I leave for the airport, Sarah and Matthew are staring forlornly at the storm door. And I'm trying to pull out of the driveway.

"There's nothing worse. That is the saddest sight."

When Matthew was younger, he used to find Mommy on the TV and kiss the screen.

Then came last year when, Gregg said, "She was on TV more than Seinfeld."

The novelty had worn thin. The kids just wanted her home.

Doris worked 112 games. In February, she did 23 games in 28 days. She had nine games in nine days, all in different cities.

Gregg, who had just left the failed International Basketball League, was at home with the kids. But it didn't make her feel any better.

"I remember being in a parking lot, I think it was in New Mexico, I was to be at a shoot-around at 9 a.m. their time," Doris said. "And I got off the phone with Sarah and Matthew and I sat in that parking lot and cried for a little bit. Because I had been away so much. It got to the point where I was calculating how much time I had been away from the kids. It was very difficult for me. Gregg was not working. But I'm their mom. Moms are moms. I wasn't there."

The ESPN deal was great thing for her. The games are spread out. She has more time for her family.

"When I see how hard she works, I still get proud as heck," said Gregg, now a consultant for the Institute for International Sport in Rhode Island. "She's a working mom who's so committed to her family. For my kids to see that, it means the world to me."