Commentary: Oh, My! Mick Hubert is Going...Going...Gone
Mick Hubert, whose signature "Oh, my!" became his calling card, was the announcer for the Gators' national championships in football, basketball and baseball.
The Voice of Gator Sports is stepping down after announcing 2,510 football, basketball and baseball games during his 33 years in UF’s broadcasting booth.
Mick Hubert, a rookie on the Gators sports broadcasting team in 1989, had the middle seat on the charter flight to Baton Rouge, La., for UF’s football game that year with LSU. On his right was kicker Arden Czyzewski. Hubert struck up a conversation and learned the proper pronunciation of Czyzewski’s name. (It’s “chi-ZHEF-skee.”)
“He kicks the game-winning field goal the next night,” Hubert said. “If I hadn’t been sitting next to him, I wouldn’t have known how to pronounce it.”
Hubert has a lot of memories like that. And that’s what they all are now: memories. On May 16, he walked into Florida athletic director Scott Stricklin’s office to tell him what Hubert had known for some time: he was ready to call it quits.
After broadcasting 2,510 Gator football, basketball and baseball games, Hubert, 68, stepped away from a job that ended with the final baseball series of the season. UF sports won’t be the same. To many fans, he is “The Voice” of the best times of their lives. He’s the only broadcaster to have been in the booth for national championships in football, basketball and baseball.
“I have been the luckiest guy in the world,” he said. “I feel like I could go another five or 10 years; I have my health and my vision. But I knew there would come a time when the grind of doing baseball and then the next thing you know it’s time for football camp, if I’m not raring to go for football, I knew it would be time. That kind of happened last year.”
Hubert and his wife, Judi, moved to Sarasota, where they had vacationed so many times and bought a house in 2019. No more prepping for games. No more late-night walks through dark parking lots. No more worrying about equipment or interviews with coaches.
Just long walks on the beach and stress-free college football Saturdays.
“This is going to be a fun college football season,” he said. “I can watch a game or not. I can turn it off if it’s boring. It’s going to be a blast.”
As stunned as the Gator Nation was with his retirement, it quickly turned into a lovefest for the guy. Heck, I’ve even suggested he belongs in UF’s Ring of Honor. We’ll miss him, and he will miss it. Not everything. That was what I wanted to talk to him about — the things he’ll miss, and the things he won’t miss.
“I’ll miss preparing,” said Hubert, who left University of Dayton’s broadcast booth to beat out 150 other applicants for the UF job. “I enjoyed getting statistics together. It gave me a little creativity in the job. Someone told me once that I should get a home computer and I finally did. I learned as I went along and started crafting charts in black and white and then in color. As I was doing it, I learned about the players.”
Published
May 25, 2022
Mick Hubert's rapport with players and coaches helped him become one of the NCAA's best sports broadcasters in the business and a UF treasure.
If there is one thing I’ll remember about Hubert’s time at UF, it was his meticulous prep work. Yes, the “Oh, my!” and the “Doering’s got a touchdown!” should be an option for every Gator fan’s ringtone. But I saw him work and heard numerous stories about how he passed on that ethic to other broadcasters, most notably current Gators baseball play-by-play man Jeff Cardozo.
“He made me what I am because he taught me early how to prepare,” Cardozo said.
Hubert will miss those relationships with his color commentators. Whether it was Mark Wise in basketball, Nick Belmonte (and Cardozo) in baseball or Lee McGriff in football, they all have stories about Hubert losing it in the booth on a big play.
“Those guys became like brothers to me,” Hubert said. “That made it special.”
And he will miss Camelot.
“Steve Spurrier is the football coach and then they hire Andy Lopez; then, Billy Donovan comes in,” he said. “Those were Hall of Fame coaches who were Hall of Fame people. I would talk with Lopez for hours about everything but baseball. Billy was the humblest guy in the world and he used to call me and invite me to film sessions on the road. He’d even ask my opinion. It was like a family during the decade of the 1990s. I’d go up to the football office and a coach would motion me into the room and draw up plays. Ron Zook would show me the punt block or punt return they were going to try so I would know what was going on and who made the real play on it.”
But Hubert will not miss the travel. Even though he had the luxury of traveling with the team, there were a lot of nights getting home at 3:30 a.m.
“The travel really got to me,” he said. “When you’re young it’s no big deal — you’re full of energy. As I was getting older, I started to realize I was the oldest guy on the bus. Older than every coach.”
He won’t miss rain and lightning delays, either.
“The ones at home games are the worst because you just want to go home.” he said. “On the road, all you’re doing is going back to your hotel room.”
And he won’t miss the lost opportunities to be with his family or just sitting under an umbrella.
All we know for sure is we will miss him. 
Sportswriter Pat Dooley (BSJ ’76) covered the Gators for The Gainesville Sun for 33 years until his retirement in 2020. He still shares his love for Gator sports through his podcast, “Another Dooley Noted,” and WRUF radio program, “Dooley’s Back 9.” His Gator Nation News column does not necessarily reflect the views of the University of Florida.
