Dave Marcus has cycled through dozens of players and hundreds of games, seasons both good and bad. In his more than two decades on the job, the voice of UCLA women’s basketball has often seen one — and sometimes two — teams from the Bruins’ conference advance to the game’s biggest stage, making him wonder when he might be able to say something like he did Sunday.
Finally, after Kiki Rice made two free throws in the final seconds and the buzzer sounded inside Spokane Arena, Marcus unleashed those sweet words.
“Final Fours up,” Marcus said, “the Bruins are on their way to Tampa.”
If UCLA’s first trip to the Final Four of the NCAA tournament has been a long time coming for coach Cori Close and her players, imagine what it feels like for Marcus. Most of the current roster was either infants or hadn’t been born when Marcus called his first game involving the team in November 2003.
Before this season, Marcus had seen the Bruins cut down nets only twice — after winning the 2006 Pac-10 tournament, when Noelle Quinn scored six points in the final 78 seconds to force overtime, and after winning the 2015 Women’s National Invitation Tournament, when Jordin Canada scored half of her team’s 62 points.
The Bruins doubled that collection of nets after climbing ladders twice in a 21-day span last month, their Big Ten tournament title followed by a victory over Louisiana State in the Spokane Regional final that set up an even bigger game against Connecticut on Friday inside Amalie Arena.
“I’ve always been curious, you know, what is the Final Four like,” Marcus said, “and we’re about to find out.”
As Marcus likes to make clear during even a short conversation, UCLA’s run isn’t about him but the stories he gets to tell. And there have been plenty over his 22 seasons.
“Dave Marcus has given UCLA women's basketball a labor of love for many, many years,” Close said. “I love his professionalism. I love his storytelling. But even more than that, I love how much he’s been committed to growing the game and honoring women’s basketball. He is truly a treasure for our program.”
Known for his conversational style and a smooth, mellifluous voice, Marcus is a one-man operation, serving as his own engineer and equipment manager. He perseveres through every challenge, like the time last season during an NCAA tournament game at Pauley Pavilion when someone unplugged his power cord ...
