CBC announces final broadcast for legendary NHL voice Bob Cole.

It is the end of an era in the hockey world.

For many young Canadians the voice of legendary broadcaster Bob Cole is synonymous with the sport of hockey, the two so intertwined that there can never truly be one without the other. It is in large part that I believe that fans have continued to worship at the alter of Cole even though it has become clear in recent years that his skills in the broadcast booth have begun to wane somewhat. Those fans however will soon have to adapt as the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation has now all but made the end of Cole's career official.

Cole will be leaving Hockey Night in Canada after he makes his final broadcast on the 6th of April 2019, the date that will officially mark the end of Cole's legendary broadcast career, one that has touched the lives of millions of Canadians across the entire country. It marks the end of an amazing career that has spanned half a century, making Cole a household name among multiple generations of Canadian men and women and making him a beloved icon of the sport in the process.

Cole however views himself as just another voice in the broadcast booth and in a recent interview he was quick to give credit to the sport of hockey, all the while diminishing the importance of his own voice in the broadcast booth.

"That's my job: to make sure that whoever is tuned in today is enjoying the game, and never mind me or whomever broadcasting, enjoy the game," Cole said as per The National. "I've gotten a lot of help and a lot of criticism too, of course, that happens in anything singular like what I'm doing.

"I love the game. Period."

There may never be another one like Cole either, he grew up absorbing the sport of hockey in a way that our more modern generations simply can not appreciate, and it may be the way that Cole learned to love the game that shaped his broadcast career in the booth.

"The radio was my everything. There was no TV at the time and Foster Hewitt was broadcasting of course out of Toronto," Cole said. "I had all the pictures of the Toronto Maple Leafs and the Montreal Canadiens, 8x10s, through Quaker Oats box-tops that were saved up by the neighbours for young Robert who got hurt and he's bedridden."

If this is indeed the end for Bob Cole, and it does appear that it is, then we wish him nothing but the best in the next chapter of his life.