The road to the Olympics looks different for every athlete, coach and broadcaster.
In Courtney Lyle's case, it's a dream come true.... but a dream that was accomplished through many years of hard work and pursuit.
"When you get into this career, you think about the pinnacle that you want to do, just like an athlete thinks about the pinnacle of being at the top of their sports, like the Olympics." Courtney Lyle said. "As an announcer calling the Olympics, it's the same dream that athletes have. It was incredible to get the call."
The call came after an entire year of waiting. When the Tokyo 2020 Olympics were put on pause, so was Lyle's Olympic dream.
Lyle serves as a national play-by-play analyst for over 80 games a year. She's called six different sports, from basketball to gymnastics... and now field hockey... a sports she's never covered.
"I started by watching every single field hockey match from Rio that they aired." Lyle said. "I could pick up on things, and if I didn't understand a term I would write it down and then google it. I also read the rule book which was really important because I want to make sure I do these athletes justice because they have worked so hard to get to this point."
Lyle and her crew will be calling the Tokyo Olympics remotely from NBC's studio in Connecticut. She says she's oddly thankful for the last year of calling games remotely during the COVID-19 pandemic, because it prepared her for the biggest stage in sports.
"I will be in a room with my analyst calling it off a monitor." Lyle said about the games. "I will be watching a live feed from Tokyo of the game and be calling that. The last year has definitely prepared me for this because I've done over one hundred games since August, and most of them have been from my home office."