Dick Vitale, ESPN's most well-known college basketball commentator, was the University of Detroit men's basketball head coach for four seasons (1973–1977) before becoming the school's Athletics Director for 1977-78. The following year he left to coach the Detroit Pistons. In his final year as a college head coach in 1977, Vitale led the Titans to a school record 25 victories and the Round of 16 in the 1977 NCAA Tournament before losing to Michigan, 86-81. Vitale ended up with a 78-30 career record as head coach of the Titans. Vitale went on to coach the Detroit Pistons before beginning his broadcasting career with ESPN in 1979 and was the color commentator for the first college basketball game carried by the new network. As its lead college basketball analyst, he helped make the network an integral part of the game's popularity. An author of six books chronicling his love affair with basketball, Vitale received the Basketball Hall of Fame's Curt Gowdy Media Award (1998), won the NABC Cliff Wells Appreciation Award in 2000 and was inducted to the College Basketball Hall of Fame in 2008. In 2011, Detroit Mercy named its basketball court at Calihan Hall in his honor.