Rachel Maddow Show

ESPN college basketball analyst Dick Vitale announced Friday that he will have surgery to remove cancer from his neck.

In a post on X, Vitale said a biopsy of a lymph node in his neck showed cancer.

Vitale said surgery is scheduled for Tuesday.

This is the latest cancer diagnosis for Vitale, 85.

In 2021, Vitale was diagnosed with lymphoma, months after he had multiple surgeries to remove melanoma. He chronicled his treatments and recovery on social media, posting photos of doctor visits and hospital stays while issuing motivational tips recorded before he was put on voice rest. In 2022, he announced that he was cancer-free. Vitale had vocal cord cancer last summer and underwent radiation treatment. In November, he announced he was cancer-free but had to push back a return to ESPN broadcasts.

Vitale said in a message shared by ESPN PR that he feels "fantastic physically" and plans to do "everything that I can control in winning this latest new setback."

A member of the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame and the College Basketball Hall of Fame, Vitale has been with ESPN since 1979, the year the network launched. He called ESPN's first college basketball broadcast.