Jim Phillips

Jim Phillips Jr.

Jim Phillips was the long time Voice of the Clemson Tigers, calling play by play for Clemson Football games, among other events. During much of that time, he served as chief sportscaster for WFBC/WYFF in Greenville SC. The following is from his obituary following his sudden death from a undiscovered dissecting aneurysm of thoracic aorta.

James Edmund Phillips Jr., 69, died Tuesday, September 9, 2003.

He was born April 23, 1934, in Youngstown, Ohio, to James and Eleanora Case Phillips. He was a graduate of Mineral Ridge High School (Ohio) and attended Ashland College in Ashland, Ohio.

Mr. Phillips moved to the Upstate of South Carolina in 1968 after stints as play-by-play announcer at Mount Union College and Kent State University. He broadcast 401 Tiger football games and more than 2,000 total Clemson sporting events in his 35-plus years as "The Voice of The Tigers." He was a multiple winner of the S.C. Sportscaster of the Year Award and a recipient of the S.C. Master of Broadcasting Award. He was inducted into the Clemson Athletic Hall of Fame in 1992.

Mr. Phillips was a frustrated golfer, an impatient fisherman and a beloved family man.

He was a member of Abiding Peace Lutheran Church.

Surviving are his daughter, Terri Blackmon and her husband, Eric, and granddaughter, Erica Blackmon, of Greenville; son, Jeff Phillips of Florence and his former wife, Ruth Adkins Phillips, of Greenville. Also surviving are a sister, Janine Regan of Niles, Ohio; and a cousin, Louis, of Ohio.

Services will be Friday at 2 p.m. at Abiding Peace Lutheran Church with burial to follow in Woodlawn Memorial Park.

Visitation will be Thursday from 7 to 9 p.m. at The President's Box at Clemson Memorial Stadium, Clemson, S.C. The family is at the home of his daughter, Terri Blackmon, 21 Zelma Drive, Greenville, SC.

In lieu of flowers, memorials may be made to Abiding Peace Lutheran Church, 401 Batesville Road, Simpsonville, SC 29681. -- The Mackey Mortuary, Century Drive, Greenville, S.C.