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When Kenny Albert came up for air after the thrilling men’s hockey gold medal victory over Canada on Sunday, he discovered that he had 483 unread text messages.
“It was overwhelming—the texts, the stories, the tweets. It does kind of feel like I’m reading about my own funeral,” Albert told Front Office Sports. “In a way, it was sort of the equivalent of working a Super Bowl. That was the magnitude of it.”
They came in from all walks of life—sports giants, former broadcast partners, politicians, and entertainers.
“Who’s the craziest one I heard from? Joe Torre, for example, who I know a little bit, but we didn’t have each other’s number,” Albert said. “We have a few mutuals, but I’m not sure where he got it. Someone like that? It blew me away to be honest.”
He got a direct message on social media from Sarah Palin, the former vice presidential candidate. The two met recently as Palin is dating former New York Ranger Ron Duguay. “She’s a big hockey fan and former sportscaster,” Albert said.
Keith Hernandez commented on Albert’s Instagram page to compliment him on the broadcast. Other people Albert heard from included play-by-play colleagues Howie Rose, Michael Kay, Suzyn Waldman, Mike Breen, and Doc Emrick, as well as former broadcast partners like Adam Wainwright, Steve Lyons, Mark Grace, Daryl “Moose” Johnston, Ronde Barber, Tim Green, and Pat LaFontaine. He also heard from his father, the legendary play-by-play broadcaster Marv Albert, as well as Wayne Gretzky, with whom he works at TNT.
Other people who reached out included Fox colleagues Erin Andrews and Pam Oliver, Craig Melvin from NBC’s Today show, Howard Stern’s producer Gary Dell’Abate, WFAN host Boomer Esiason, New York sportscaster Len Berman, and legends like Bill Raftery and Jim Gray. He also got a direct message from Kirk Herbstreit, whom he’s never met.
“It’s the most texts I’ve ever gotten in one day,” Albert said. “I usually look at my phone during commercials once in a while and I try to answer people pretty quickly. Sunday was like no other day I’ve ever had. I did check in on the family group chat with my wife and kids, but I tried not to look at anything else. I wanted to be focused.”
It was such a whirlwind that Albert waited until his 10-hour flight from Italy to Atlanta on Monday to get back to everyone.
“I felt so bad that I couldn’t get back to everyone that I took three hours on the plane responding, and then more messages kept coming in,” Albert said. “I slept one hour on the plane. I was probably answering texts and emails for the other nine hours.”
No Rest for the Weary
Albert called 24 games in 18 days for NBC in Milan-Cortina, including thrilling overtime victories for the men against Sweden in the semis and Canada in the Finals, and another overtime triumph for the women, also against Canada.
“We went to a celebratory dinner after the gold medal game. It was the first time I ate at a restaurant in two weeks,” Albert said, noting that “dinner after the semifinal game was pasta in a plastic takeout tray, eaten with a wooden fork, in five minutes.”
He was supposed to fly back home to New York for a day, but the plans got upended by the blizzard, and NBC opted instead to send a charter plane full of people from its Olympics team from Italy to Atlanta. Albert got back from dinner at 11 p.m. local time, hung around the hotel lobby for a couple of hours, packed, and got two hours of sleep before his flight.
It will not be a long rest, as Albert and Eddie Olcyzk, his broadcast partner during the Olympics, are on the call for Golden Knights-Kings in Los Angeles Wednesday night on TNT.
Full Circle Moment
As brothers Quinn and Jack Hughes scored the overtime goals against Sweden and Canada, respectively, it was a crazy confluence for Albert, who has known them since they were toddlers.
He actually broadcast the 2004 Women’s Frozen Four with their mother, Ellen Weinberg-Hughes, on College Sports Television (CSTV), the now-defunct channel which eventually became CBS Sports Network.
“I’ve actually known her [Ellen] since the early 1990s,” Albert said. “Quinn and Jack were 4 and 2 at the time [of the Frozen Four]. I’ve known the family and they’re great people.”
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