Pittsburgh, Pa. – Ray Goss, who completed his 57th season as the radio play-by-play voice of Duquesne University men’s basketball in 2024-25, has been voted by the National Sports Media Association (NSMA) as the winner of the 2025 Woody Durham Voice of College Sports Award. Goss will be presented the honor during the 65th NSMA Awards Banquet Monday, June 30, 2025, in Greensboro, N.C., at Grandover Resort.
Created in 2018, the Woody Durham Voice of College Sports Award recognizes professional college broadcasters who fit the following criteria: association with his/her school, tenure at their school, efforts in the community, mentorship of young broadcasters and character. The award is named for the legendary, 40-year play-by-play announcer for the University of North Carolina and is sponsored by Learfield and the UNC Department of Athletics.
Voting for the Woody Durham Voice of College Sports Award is done by a select group of NSMA member play-by-play announcers, including past winners, as well as representatives of the two sponsoring organizations. Goss is the eighth winner of the award, and he joins broadcasting luminaries Don Fischer of Indiana (2018), Bill Hillgrove of Pittsburgh (2019), Johnny Holliday of Maryland (2020), Gene Deckerhoff of Florida State (2021), Joe Starkey of California (2022), Rich Chvotkin of Georgetown (2023) and Mike Reis of Southern Illinois (2024).
The Voice of the Dukes called his first basketball game March 17, 1968, when Duquesne faced Fordham in the first round of the National Invitation Tournament (NIT) in New York, N.Y., at the famed Madison Square Garden. He began his full-time tenure as the play-by-play radio announcer at the beginning of the 1968-69 season and has missed just two games during his entire DU broadcasting career. The first came Jan. 7, 1978, at Penn State, when Goss auditioned for a regional play-by-play position with the National Basketball Association (NBA), and the other March 21, 2011, at Oregon, while mourning his wife, Dee, who passed away the evening of Duquesne’s victory at Montana five days earlier in the College Basketball Invitational (CBI).
In his first season as the play-by-play voice of Duquesne basketball, Goss called a 75-72 victory over No. 8 St. John’s in College Park, Md., in a consolation game in the East Regional of the 1969 NCAA Championship. His career came full circle in 2024, as the Dukes defeated No. 21 BYU, 71-67, in the first round of the 2024 NCAA Championship in Omaha, Neb., at the CHI Health Center as Duquesne was making its first appearance in the NCAA Tournament in 47 years.
Goss’ longest consecutive game streak spanned 977 games from Jan. 9, 1978, an 89-76 victory at West Virginia, to March 16, 2011, when the Dukes earned an 87-76 triumph at Montana in the first round of the 2011 CBI. Even with the onset of the global pandemic in 2020 due to COVID-19, Goss continued to call games remotely at Duquesne so fans of the program could continue to listen to his broadcast of the action.
A 1993 inductee into the Duquesne Athletics Hall of Fame, Goss is a 1958 graduate of DU, where he earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in radio and television journalism. He was also inducted into the Pennsylvania Association of Broadcasters (PAB) Hall of Fame in 2023 alongside Edgar Snyder, Bill Hillgrove and the Miracle League of Southwestern Pennsylvania and is the author of a 2008 book titled “Misadventures in Broadcasting,” which details his unusual and incredible experiences throughout 60+ years in the field.
In addition to his role at Duquesne, Goss has an extensive history of sports radio experience with over 3,000 events called during his career. He began at WDAD in Indiana, Pa., in 1959, and served as the general manager of the station for 15 years until 1981, when he and Mark Harley co-founded WCCS, which used Homer City, Pa., as its base of operations. In addition, Goss co-hosted “The First ABA Championship,” alongside coach Vince Cazetta, the head coach of the Pittsburgh Pipers in the inaugural season of the American Basketball Association (ABA) in 1968-69, worked extensively covering Indiana University of Pennsylvania (IUP) sports with Jack Benedict, the Voice of IUP Athletics, in Indiana, Pa., as well as a stint with the Pittsburgh Piranhas of the Continental Basketball Association (CBA) in 1994-95.
Goss and his late wife have seven children, 14 grandchildren and two great-grandchildren.
Tickets for the 65th NSMA awards banquet can be purchased via the following link. In addition to Goss earning the Woody Durham Voice of College Sports Award, honorees at this year’s banquet include Ian Eagle of CBS, Westwood One and TNT as the 2024 National Sportscaster of the Year and Ken Rosenthal of The Athletic as the 2024 National Sportswriter of the Year, while the 2025 NSMA Hall of Fame inductees include Mike Tirico, Dan Shaughnessy, the late Charlie Jones and the late Wendell Smith, who began his professional writing career in 1937 with the Pittsburgh Courier covering both the Homestead Grays and Pittsburgh Crawfords.
ABOUT THE NATIONAL SPORTS MEDIA ASSOCIATION (NSMA)
The National Sports Media Association, Inc., is a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization which seeks to develop educational opportunities for those who are interested in pursuing a career in sports media through networking, interning, mentoring and scholarship programs. The NSMA also honors, preservers and celebrates the diverse legacy of sports media in the United States. Founded in 1959 as the National Sportscasters and Sportswriters Association in Salisbury, N.C., the NSSA added its Hall of Fame in 1962, with Grantland Rice as its first member. The organization rebranded to the National Sports Media Association in 2016 and moved to Winston-Salem, N.C., one year later. For more information on NSMA, please visit nationalsportsmedia.org.
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