Fans are praying for Kirk Herbstreit and his family following some heartbreaking personal news.
The ESPN broadcaster attracted rife criticism after Ohio State beat Notre Dame to win the National Championship on Monday night, especially because he could not hold the tears back during the postgame segment on SportsCenter.
He has since disclosed how hard the last year has been for him, revealing his wife Alison was diagnosed with breast cancer in 2024, compounding the loss of his dog Ben and his son Zak’s heart issues.
“I haven’t really talked about this publicly, but Ali my wife faced some stuff. It’s been a tough year for me behind the scenes,” Herbstreit said on ‘The Pat McAfee Show’. “My wife got diagnosed with breast cancer, Ben dies, it was just a lot of emotion. And when you do what we do, you endure.
“You do your job. And I think what happened, I couldn’t predict it, but when they won … it was like almost, I don’t know, maybe a release of all that pent-up stuff. And it just got the best of me. I’m an emotional guy in general and when things touch my heart, I’m not good at talking when that happens.”
