NBC Airs Celebrity Golf This Weekend

NBC is in Nevada for an event its aired since losing MLB back in 1989. It’s the Celebrity Golf tournament taking place in Lake Tahoe. Unfortunately, the timing is bad as the PGA Tour is also in the area, but this has always been a popular event. Here’s NBC’s press release.

MICHAEL JORDAN, CHARLES BARKLEY, TONY ROMO & AARON RODGERS HEADLINE NBC SPORTS’ COVERAGE OF AMERICAN CENTURY CHAMPIONSHIP

  
“…the best-kept secret in sports.” – ESPN The Magazine on the American Century Championship

NEW YORK – July 13, 2010 – NBC Sports presents live coverage of the 21^st annual American Century Championship, the nation’s premier celebrity golf tournament, from Edgewood Tahoe Golf Course in Lake Tahoe, Nev., this Saturday and Sunday, 3-6 p.m. ET. Eighty sports and entertainment stars will compete in what ESPN The Magazine calls “the best-kept secret in sports,” including Michael Jordan, Charles Barkley, Tony Romo, Aaron Rodgers, Troy Aikman, John Elway, Jerry Rice, Oscar de la Hoya, Ray Allen, Don Cheadle, and Brian Baumgarten of The Office.

Dan Hicks, Roger Maltbie, Gary Koch, Mark Rolfing, Dottie Pepper, and Jimmy Roberts anchor NBC Sports’ coverage.

First-time celebrities making the trip to Lake Tahoe include former MLB pitchers Greg Maddux and John Smoltz, Team USA Olympic ice hockey captain and New Jersey Devils star Jamie Langenbrunner, and Football Night in America analyst and two-time Super Bowl champion Rodney Harrison.

Eight-time champion and former MLB pitcher Rick Rhoden returns to defend his title. Past champions in the field include: former NFL quarterback Chris Chandler, former NHL star Dan Quinn, former NFL quarterback Mark Rypien, former NFL quarterback Billy Joe Tolliver, and actor Jack Wagner.

ESPN The Magazine on the American Century Championship’s star power: “Sure, you could attend a Hall of Fame induction ceremony and see plenty of legends, but they’d all be from the same sport. You could sneak into the ESPYs and find all manner of jocks, but aside from the ceremony itself and maybe a pre- or postparty, that’s it. They’re in, they’re out. People swear by the NBA All-Star weekend and Super Bowl week, but the host towns are so big and the party schedule so jam-packed that you never come close to getting all the big dogs in the same place at the same time. In Tahoe, you do. For five days straight.”

For the fifth year in a row, the Lance Armstrong Foundation (LAF) is the official charity of the American Century Championship. The tournament will help build awareness of the LIVESTRONG Global Cancer Campaign, while raising funds for the LAF’s cancer survivorship initiatives.

Additional element surrounding this year’s tournament:

• Jimmy Roberts interviewed actors Bill Murray, Chevy Chase and Cindy Morgan (who played character Lacey Underall), director Harold Ramis, and Tiger Woods for a feature that will air on Saturday honoring the 30^th anniversary of Caddyshack, the legendary and irreverent golf film that debuted in 1980.

That’s it.