Tom Kelly, longtime voice of USC sports, dies at 88 – LA Daily News

Tom Kelly, the signature voice of USC sports starting in the early 1960s and spanning five decades, died Monday morning at his home in Encino after a long battle with cancer.

Kelly died two days before his 89th birthday Wednesday.

Born in Minneapolis and starting his career in Wisconsin, Kelly came to Los Angeles from Illinois via a recommendation from Jack Buck to join Chick Hearn on USC football and basketball for the 1961-62 season at KNX radio. When Hearn left the next year to start broadcasting the newly relocated Lakers, Kelly began a Southern California broadcasting career that included calling five USC national championship football seasons from John McKay to Pete Carroll.

Kelly’s booming voice that rose to the level of the action was also heard in Los Angeles on pro football (NFL’s San Diego Chargers and USFL’s L.A. Express), NBA (Clippers), boxing and golf. He also worked as a sportscaster at KCBS-Channel 2 and KTTV-Channel 11, winning five Golden Mike Awards and the California Sportscaster of the Year by both the AP and UPI three times.

Kelly was the original voice of the Prime Ticket all-sports cable channel when it launched in 1985 prior to becoming Fox Sports West.

He was inducted into the USC Athletic Hall of Fame in 2001 and the Southern California Sports Broadcasters Hall of Fame in 2005.

“Having grown up in Southern California as a sports fan hearing all the great announcers, then as a big USC fan, I really studied his mannerisms and inflections and the excitement level he brought,” said Pete Arbogast, the USC radio play-by-play man on football since 2001. “I remember getting up for USC-Notre Dames in South Bend that started at 10 a.m., getting all the snacks lined up and just listening to him call it, from pregame to postgame, because it wasn’t on TV.

“There were even delayed televised USC games he called which wouldn’t air on Channel 11 until 11 p.m., and we would stay away from all the news reports until then to watch it as if it was live.”

Arbogast calls Kelly an “idol” of his growing up and says that as an homage to Kelly, he tries to insert some of his phrases into current broadcasts.

“His voice was something you could hear from a subway tunnel six blocks away,” Arbogast said. “He was the voice — he was the guy.”

While Kelly would frequently attend USC games at the Coliseum in recent years, Arbogast brought him into the broadcast booth during the second half of the Trojans’ 49-14 win over Notre Dame in 2014 to talk about his memories of the series.

“We all stopped and just had open mouths as he told us stories on the air,” Arbogast said. “Before we knew it, there were about 25 people streaming into the booth to listen to him.”

After he was injured while playing football at Northland College in Ashland, Wis., Kelly helped with the school’s radio broadcasts. His broadcasting career continued in Duluth, Minn., Des Moines, Iowa, and then Peoria, Ill.

“The Lord blessed me with a voice that isn’t objectionable to listeners, is recognizable by many and has the ability to stand before people,” Kelly said in his 2007 biography. “I hope I didn’t alienate anyone down the line, but I loved doing what I did and loved broadcasting for the team I covered.

“It has been an unbelievable career … there’s no rhyme or reason how I managed to remain the Voice of the Trojans except luck and good fortune. … I don’t know how I qualified but I’m thankful. I enjoyed every moment and realize I was one of the fortunate ones.”

Kelly is survived by his wife Danuska, four children, one step son and six grandchildren. Services are pending.