Vitale is signed with ESPN through the 2021–22 college basketball season. Vitale was recruited to do color in the first two rounds of the NCAA tournament by CBS but ESPN would not allow it. However, ESPN's analysts Jay Bilas and Len Elmore were allowed to provide color for CBS's tournament coverage, teaming with play-by-play announcers Dick Enberg and Gus Johnson. However, this is slightly misleading as Elmore continues to call games for both CBS and ESPN during the college basketball season; in Bilas' case he was loaned to CBS for the tournament only in 2003 and from 2005–2010.