Back in the mid 1970s, former St. John's University basketball and Miami Heat radio broadcaster David Halberstam broadcasted a Brandeis basketball game in Waltham as the play-by-play man for schools in the City University of New York system. Over 30 years later he returned to Waltham, calling the men's basketball game Sunday against Carnegie Mellon University for WBRS, the Brandeis radio station. But this time he was sitting beside his son, Manny Halberstam '10, a member of the WBRS sports staff. The idea first came to the elder Halberstam after the two attended a Brandeis-New York University basketball game in New York City."Marv Albert is sort of an icon, particularly in New York," David Halberstam said about his inspiration for the idea. "His son went to [New York University], Kenny Albert, so Kenny was doing the games for the NYU radio station, and he brought Marv down to do one half of the game and he did the other half. . I thought it would be an interesting idea to have Manny do that."

That was also the moment when the younger Halberstam, then a first-year, decided to join the WBRS team. Like Marv Albert and his son, the two took turns doing the play-by-play. Manny did the first half while his father provided color commentary, and then the two switched for the second half.

"It was sort of a dream come true in many ways," David Halberstam said. "Even though my play-by-play career is behind me, I know that Manny really has no plans now of pursuing it, but nonetheless it was quite something to be able to sit near my son, and he did a very good job."

After the broadcast David Halberstam met with a group of sports broadcasters from WBRS to talk to them about his experiences and to give them advice for pursuing a career in the industry.

David Halberstam began his career calling games for the City University of New York schools before moving on to St. John's University, which at the time had one of the best basketball teams in the state of New York. However, they did not have a radio announcer because of financial issues. So in exchange for getting to call the games, Halberstam had to sell ads for the station, which soon became a major part of his career.

Then in 1992, David Halberstam got what he called his "dream job." He started calling play-by-play for the National Basketball Association's Miami Heat. During his time there he got to call some memorable games, including a 1997 second-round playoff game versus the New York Knicks where a brawl broke out on the floor after Heat forward PJ Brown flipped Knicks point guard Charlie Ward over his head.

Halberstam had another chance to call a classic in a 1998 first-round playoff game versus the Knicks when Knicks coach Jeff Van Gundy hung onto the leg of Heat center Alonzo Mourning during another brawl. During that time he also helped the team in sell advertising.

After leaving that job in 1998 he got a job at Westwood One, starting out in sales and advertising and eventually becoming the head of the sports division.

David Halberstam, now principal of Haly Group Inc; a company dedicated to serve as sales representative for various media, has also written a book on the history of New York radio and occasionally writes articles for Web sites such as Yahoo! Sports, where he recently ranked the top 50 network announcers of all time. His top five are Howard Cosell; John Madden, whom Halberstam said "changed the game;" Brent Musburger, who "invented studio shows;" Al Michaels, "the voice of primetime;" and Dick Enberg, who Halberstam said made people smile in every broadcast.

The professional broadcaster told the WBRS staff about the importance of a liberal arts education, as it allows broadcasters to add interesting and relevant facts during the games. He also discussed the importance of description, or as he put it "painting the word picture" for the audience.

He also recommended focusing on just a few themes or stories for the entire broadcast, and pausing at various moments to increase suspense, increasing one's vocabulary and talking to the officials beforehand to learn the rules of the game.

While the younger Halberstam does not see himself following in his father's footsteps, he understands that the lessons learned from broadcasting can help him in other walks of life as well.

"I'm going to law school. . I really look at this as a skill that can be helpful in any walk of life in the future and anything that I do," Manny Halberstam said. "It's the art of describing something, being able to come up with the words really quickly to describe something."

Adam Rosen '10, WBRS sports director, said he and the other members of his staff also learned a lot from speaking with David Halberstam.

"I don't know if it's ever been done before, to bring in a former professional broadcaster," Rosen said. "I think it's a great opportunity for me personally and the entire department just to learn from him. . I found I really enjoyed listening to the broadcast and I took a lot away from it."

And perhaps the best piece of advice the elder Halberstam gave the students was simple but still effective.

"Do what you enjoy in life. If you do, you'll find a way to make money out of it.