"Just had a scope of my vocal cords & I was very emotional with the great report by Dr ZEITELS. He said the vocal cords are cancer free & he feels I can return to my love of being at courtside for @espn," Vitale posted on X with pictures of himself in the doctor’s chair.
Vitale has not lost his passion for college basketball at 85 years old, but he has been through tremendous battles with cancer, including melanoma, lymphoma and laryngeal cancer over recent years.
But Vitale announced in December 2024 that he was officially cancer-free, though it wasn’t known if he’d be returning courtside to call some of the country’s best college basketball matchups.
So, this news after his checkup with Zeitels is significant because he clearly wants to get back to entertaining the fans with his enthusiastic broadcasting on game days.
"Dick, you’re back!" Zeitels said in a video posted to Vitale’s Facebook Watch. "Your vocal cords are not going to hold you up.
"We've been down this road a long time. I didn't know we could get here, but we are here. And you're ready to be with your viewers, the players, ESPN, you're ready to be with everyone again."
Vitale got emotional after Zeitels said those words, and the doctor comforted him, knowing all too well what he’s been through.
"Dickie V" has spent 41 years as a college basketball broadcaster after spending time coaching at various levels, from high school to the NBA.
The New Jersey native spent time coaching at Garfield High School before taking over his alma mater, East Rutherford High School, where he led teams to two New Jersey state titles.
Vitale would go on to coach as an assistant at Rutgers before heading to the University of Detroit as their head coach. He’d remain in the Michigan city to coach its Pistons from 1978-79.
Once he was done coaching the Pistons, Vitale joined ESPN, calling its first-ever college basketball game in 1979, a game where DePaul beat Wisconsin, and the rest has been sweet history.
Now, Vitale is excited to get back to his love, as he says, and it’s safe to say every college basketball fan can’t wait for his long-awaited return.
Romanian Olympic medalist Ana Barbosu announced her commitment to Stanford on Wednesday.
"It feels almost surreal to announce that I’ve been accepted to Stanford University!" she wrote in a statement. "Can’t wait to join this amazing family! Go Card!"
Barbosu will now compete right up the coast from American gymnast Jordan Chiles, who goes to UCLA. Stanford and UCLA are historic rivals in college sports, as they were flagship schools in the Pac-12 before the conference saw a mass exodus of programs last season.
UCLA is now in its inaugural season in the Big Ten, while Stanford has joined the ACC. However, the two gymnastics programs still compete against each other, as they have a meeting scheduled this season for March, and will likely continue to face each other in the future.
With Chiles still set to compete for UCLA in 2026, any potential matchup vs. Stanford will pit the two gymnasts against each other after they were at the center of a global controversy over the rightful winner of a bronze medal at the 2024 Paris Olympics. Chiles is currently engaged in a court battle over the medal.
At the end of the floor exercise final at the summer games in August, Barbosu clinched third place and a spot on the podium after judging initially finished. Barbosu was visibly thrilled when she saw the final scores.
But then, a U.S. coach spoke to the judges and appealed the scoring on one of Chiles' moves. After review, Chiles' score was bumped up, putting the American in third place, and leaving Barbosu off the podium. When Barbosu looked up and saw the scoring change on the board, she dropped the Romanian flag she was holding, covered her face with her hands and walked away in tears.
Chiles went on to accept the bronze medal and join her U.S. teammate Simone Biles and the gold-medal winner Brazilian Rebeca Andrade on the podium.
But days later on Aug. 10, it was announced that the Court of Arbitration for Sport ruled that the judging panel had improperly granted an inquiry that increased Chiles' score. It ruled that the appeal had been submitted past the one-minute deadline and should not have been granted.
The next day, the International Olympic Committee determined Chiles had to return the bronze medal she won in the Paris Olympics.
Though Chiles was ordered to return the medal, there have been no reports that she has. She called the ruling "unjust" in a statement later that week.
"This decision feels unjust and comes as a significant blow, not just to me, but to everyone who has championed my journey. To add to the heartbreak, the unprompted racially driven attacks on social media are wrong and extremely hurtful. I’ve poured my heart and soul into this sport and I am so proud to represent my culture and my country," Chiles said.
Meanwhile, Barbosu received her bronze medal shortly after the Olympics ended, and expressed sympathy for her American opponent, as well as a Romanian teammate, Sabrina Maneca-Voinea, whose finish was also impacted by the back-and-forth scoring change.
"I can't help but think about Sabrina and Jordan right now," Bărbosu said in a statement. "It's a difficult situation for us, with so many uncertainties and overwhelming emotions. I hope everyone understands that we have not done anything wrong at the Olympics. And that the Olympic spirit is more important than any misunderstanding between the authorities.
"I want to believe that the day will come when all three of us will receive a bronze medal."
Chiles went on to say that the emotional devastation of losing the medal was related to her "skin color," when she gave her first sit-down interview about the incident this week during a panel at the Forbes Power Women's Summit 2024 in September.
"To me, everything that has gone on is not about the medal, it's about, you know, my skin color," Chiles said, sobbing.
Chiles previously claimed she was facing "racially driven attacks" from social media users in a statement posted to X on Aug. 15. When Chiles won the bronze medal, it resulted in the first gymnastics podium in Olympic history that featured three black contestants.
Chiles and Team USA are currently involved in an appeal against a Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) for its decision.
Chiles' lawyers have argued that her coach did in fact make the request in time and that there is video evidence to prove it, and have also indicated that the official who made the decision to strip Chiles' medal had ties to Romania.
"Chiles asks the Supreme Court to find that the CAS decision was procedurally deficient for two reasons," Chiles’ lawyers said in a statement, according to Olympics.com.
"First, CAS violated Chiles’ fundamental ‘right to be heard’ by refusing to consider the video evidence that showed her inquiry was submitted on time – in direct contradiction to the findings in CAS’ decision.
"Second, the entire CAS proceeding was unfair because Chiles was not properly informed that Hamid G. Gharavi, the President of the CAS panel that revoked Chiles’s bronze medal and awarded it instead to a Romanian gymnast, had a serious conflict of interest: Mr. Gharavi has acted as counsel for Romania for almost a decade and was actively representing Romania at the time of the CAS arbitration."
Chiles has also filed an appeal in the Swiss Federal Supreme Court to overturn the CAS decision. She argued that she was not given a fair opportunity to defend herself and that the CAS did not properly consider video evidence.
A water treatment plant failure threw North America’s oldest continuous lawmaking body into crisis this week, as lawmakers were effectively shut out of the Virginia State Capitol for safety reasons.
Throughout the rest of Richmond, residents were dealing with a lack of water, and hospitals had to employ tanker trucks to provide the water needed not only to quench patients, but to provide heat and sanitization of medical implements, according to one state lawmaker.
The right-leaning group Virginia Project said the crisis may be the reason for the legislature to take an immediate interest in infrastructure funding, before offering a Confederate-era suggestion:
"Perhaps the waterless legislature should retreat to Appomattox," a social media post from the group said, referring to the community about 100 miles southwest of the Capitol: where the Richmond-based Confederate States of America surrendered to the Union in April 1865.
Others, like Virginia Republican Party chair Richard Anderson, placed blame on the recently-departed Democratic mayor who is now running for lieutenant governor.
"[The crisis is] a direct result of inept leadership by former Mayor Levar Stoney of Richmond--who presided over his city's crumbling infrastructure," Anderson said.
"Stoney as LG? Never."
The crisis hit less than one week after the current Democratic mayor, Dr. Danny Avula, took office.
Avula, previously a pediatrician at Chippenham Hospital in neighboring Chesterfield County, said he has been hands-on since the water system first failed.
Avula said he spent much of Tuesday night at the city plant and announced Wednesday morning that some of the pumps are beginning to come back online.
"We're starting to see that reservoir level fill up. It's really encouraging. Right now the reservoir level is at 7ft for some context. [Our] reservoirs typically run at about 18ft."
Avula’s work drew him bipartisan praise, including from one prominent Republican.
State Sen. Mark Obenshain of Harrisonburg, the Senate GOP Caucus Chair, said he’s never seen a legislative session begin in such chaos in his 21 years in the Capitol.
"Kudos to the new mayor for his tireless efforts to resolve this inherited crisis," he said on X, formerly Twitter.
State Senate Minority Leader Ryan McDougle, R-Hanover, told Fox News Digital the water outage doubly affected his work, as both the Capitol and his district office in nearby Mechanicsville both felt the effects.
McDougle said the outage’s reach has gone beyond Richmond’s limits and into Henrico and Hanover counties to the north and east. Constituents have been reaching out to his office for help.
McDougle praised Gov. Glenn Youngkin for being "extremely aggressive in trying to find solutions to the problem that was created in the city," and offered the same for officials in suburban counties.
"[We are] trying to make sure that we're getting water to infrastructure like hospitals, so that they can continue to treat patients and to get water available to citizens so that they can take care of their families.
"But this has been a real effort on behalf of the state government and local jurisdictions trying to assist Richmond."
He said Avula does not deserve blame for the crisis, as he only took office days ago.
"It’s a shame this had to be on his first week," McDougle said.
"But we need to really investigate and get to the bottom of how [the Stoney] administration could have let this become such an acute problem that would impact so many people."
Schools in McDougle’s district were shut down Wednesday, and the legislature was gaveled out until Monday — after concerns from leaders and staff that the fire-suppression system in the iconic Capitol could malfunction without enough water flow.
McDougle remarked that while exercising caution is wise, Virginia’s spot as the oldest continuous legislature obviously predated utilities, and that the people’s work can and should be done in whatever way possible while the Capitol is out-of-order.
Another state lawmaker put the blame at the foot of Richmond’s longtime Democratic leadership.
Del. Wren Williams, R-Stuart, said Richmond has been a city "plagued by systemic neglect and a lack of accountability."
"Now, Stoney wants to be our commonwealth's next lieutenant governor. Despite the city's growing infrastructure needs, Democrats in Richmond allowed critical issues like water contamination and aging pipes to fester, leaving residents vulnerable to unsafe drinking water and deteriorating public health," Williams said.
He previously proposed a bill that would have allowed state agencies to study utility upgrades and provide engineering support.
With Democrats marginally in control of the legislature and hoping to prevent Youngkin’s deputy Winsome Sears from succeeding him in November, Williams said the crisis is emblematic of Democrats’ "larger failure… in Virginia, where promises of progress and equity often ring hollow when the real work of maintaining essential services is neglected."
Richmond businessowner Jimmy Keady echoed Williams, telling Fox News Digital the crisis isn’t just a failure of infrastructure but of past city leadership:
"For nearly 48 hours, businesses have forced to close. Residents were left without clean water, and hourly workers lost wages," Keady said.
"The political implications are just as severe," added Keady, who is also a political consultant.
He noted Virginia’s legislature is only in session for a few months, and referenced how lawmakers must explicitly pass resolutions to extend business beyond a term’s end date.
"By losing nearly 11% of this short session, Virginia lawmakers are losing valuable time to pass legislation that will address growing problems throughout our commonwealth, such as economic growth, rising medical costs, and — sure enough — aging infrastructure."
Richmond’s water supply is primarily sourced by the James River.
Fox News Digital reached out to Stoney's campaign and House Speaker Don Scott Jr., D-Portsmouth. Avula could not be reached.
In remarks late Wednesday, Youngkin praised public and private partners around the capital region that have helped residents deal with the lack of water, from Avula to companies like Amazon and Publix.
"The collaboration from the surrounding counties with the city of Richmond and the state resources has been truly inspiring. The counties of Hanover, Henrico and Chesterfield not only brought to bear all their expertise in emergency management, but their resources."
"They all mobilized fire-pump trucks in order to make sure that if there was a fire emergency and there was no water available in the city, that in fact the city could react really quickly to those urgencies."
Los Angeles Clippers star Kawhi Leonard will reportedly take a step back from the team to be with his family as it deals with the wildfires raging in the area.
Several wildfires have burned across Southern California since Tuesday afternoon.
Officials in Los Angeles said the Pacific Palisades fire has become the most destructive in the city’s history.
"He is going to tend to family in the LA area who were forced to evacuate due to the wildfires that are going on over there," NBA insider Chris Haynes said in a video posted to X Wednesday.
Leonard just made his season debut Saturday night, when the Clippers defeated the Atlanta Hawks. He had been out nine months due to what the team described as right knee injury recovery. He hadn’t played since April 26, a playoff game against the Dallas Mavericks.
Leonard is from Los Angeles and went to King High School in Riverside.
Multiple people have died and more than 1,000 buildings have been destroyed. Thousands more have fled their homes to seek shelter as the fires have gotten out of control, fueled by winds that have topped 60-70 mph.
"This morning, we woke up to a dark cloud over all of Los Angeles. But it is darkest for those who are most intimately impacted by these fires. It has been an immensely painful 24 hours," LA County Supervisor Lindsey Horvath said earlier Wednesday.
An NHL game between the Los Angeles Kings and Calgary Flames has been postponed. The NFL is keeping an eye on the conditions ahead of Monday’s playoff game between the Los Angeles Rams and Minnesota Vikings.
Matt Garman leads AWS with 11 executives amid rising cloud and AI competition.
Garman, an Amazon veteran, became AWS CEO in June, succeeding Adam Selipsky.
Julia White, ex-SAP and Microsoft, is the latest addition as AWS's chief marketing officer.
A leaked Amazon Web Services organizational chart shows the 11 executives helping new CEO Matt Garman lead the unit through a period of intense competition in cloud computing and artificial intelligence.
Garman, an 18-year veteran of AWS, became its CEO in June. He took over from Adam Selipsky, who led the unit for three years after previous AWS CEO Andy Jassy was promoted to run all of Amazon.
Garman, who previously ran AWS sales and marketing, made a few changes to the cloud business when he took over, including combining global sales teams.
Since then, the biggest change to Garman's team was to hire Julia White as chief marketing officer.
Here are the 11 executives who report to Garman:
AWS CMO Julia White.
Courtesy of Business Insider
Julia White: VP, WW AWS Marketing
White joined AWS as CMO in November. She was most recently the chief marketing and solutions officer at SAP. Prior to that, she spent nearly two decades at Microsoft in roles including corporate vice president of product marketing for the Azure cloud unit.
"Julia will join my leadership team and further develop and execute our global marketing strategy, playing a pivotal part in AWS's growth," Garman wrote of White in an email announcing her appointment.
Peter DeSantis: SVP, AWS Utility Computing
AWS SVP Peter DeSantis.
Amazon
DeSantis was one of the first AWS employees and played a critical role building up its technology. He's a member of Andy Jassy's senior leadership team at Amazon, called the "s-team."
DeSantis took over utility computing in 2021 when Charlie Bell, considered one of the founders of the cloud unit, left for Microsoft.
Kalyanaraman, who has spent nearly 20 years at Amazon, took over infrastructure and network services for DeSantis when Bell left.
Colleen Aubrey: SVP, AWS Solutions
Aubrey has spent nearly 20 years at Amazon, but switched to AWS in May around the time Selipsky left. She leads the AWS unit responsible for business applications. Aubrey is a member of Jassy's s-team.
Elizabeth Baker: VP, Private Pricing
Baker has been at Amazon since 2016 and runs the unit responsible for custom agreements between AWS and customers, providing terms like discounts based on usage. Baker's past roles include positions at SAP and Oracle.
Werner Vogels: VP and CTO
Amazon CTO Werner Vogels
Amazon
Werner Vogels is technically the chief technology officer of Amazon overall, but he has another important role within AWS. He acts as one of the public faces of the company's cloud business and technical infrastructure.
Greg Pearson: VP, AWS Global Sales
After Garman became CEO, he integrated global sales teams under Greg Pearson, combining AWS Global Sales, WW Public Sector, the Greater China Region, and Sales Strategy and Operations.
Kathrin Renz: VP, AWS Industries
Renz leads the organization responsible for industry-specific AWS products for customers. She's had the role since 2020 and Garman expanded her purview when he took over as CEO to include AWS Enterprise GenAI sales and business development VP Scott Rosecrans's team.
Laura Grit: VP/Distinguished Engineer, Technical Advisor
Grit, a 17-year Amazon veteran, is the technical advisor to the AWS CEO. She previously led Amazon.com's migration from on-premise data centers to AWS cloud services.
Borno has been at AWS since 2021. When Garman took over, he put Borno in charge of a new unit combining its Channels and Alliances team, responsible for relationships between global partners and customers, and its WW Specialist Organization, which connects service teams to customers.
Uwem Ukpong: VP, Global Services
Ukpong runs the AWS Global Services Organization, which includes training, professional services in commercial and public sectors, customer support and managed services, and security. Garman expanded Ukpong's role last year to include its Sovereign Cloud and International Product Management teams.
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49ers general manager John Lynch, coach Kyle Shanahan and quarterback Brock Purdy have made it clear that they intend to reach an agreement with the hope that it will be done sooner than later.
Elle Fanning sat next to Kylie Jenner, who was Timothée Chalamet's date, at the 'A Complete Unknown' table for the Golden Globe Awards on Sunday, Jan. 5
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