His smooth, baritone voice and matter-of-fact delivery make Dan Davis instantly recognizable to most sports radio listeners, but few know the ESPN Radio man is a Mainer.

Also known as “The Duke,” Davis was born in Portland, but his family moved to Lexington, Mass., shortly after the longtime announcer turned a year old. Nowadays, Davis and his wife Annette reside a short drive away from ESPN’s studios in Bristol, Conn. The SportsCenter Radio anchor provides live updates twice hourly weekdays from 9 a.m. to 3:40 p.m.

“I really enjoy my job. It’s different every day,” Davis said. “I still have deadlines, but I love sports and I haven’t lost my excitement for great sports moments.”

Davis got on his path to an announcing career shortly after winning a public speaking contest as a freshman at Exeter (N.H.) High School.

“John Dunklee, the dean of boys, suggested I consider a broadcasting career and I was really taken with the idea right away,” Davis recalled.

So much so that Davis opted not for a four-year college and went with a one-year program offered by Northeast Broadcast School in Massachusetts.

“I was young and impatient,” Davis said with a chuckle.

From there, it was on to his first job as an afternoon radio host in Laconia, N.H., where he met his wife while doing his show from behind the storefront window at a J.J. Newberry’s store.

“I would mention her on my show every now and then. One day I saw her outside and I went out and asked her out,” said Davis, who has been married to Annette for 42 years.

Davis has four sons (Daniel, Gregory, Steven, and Cameron) and two grandchildren.

Davis eventually migrated back to Massachusetts and went to work for Boston’s WRKO (680 AM) as a sportscast anchor and part-time play-by-play announcer. Then came a call from fledgling ESPN Radio.

“They asked about me working weekends, but at that time they were only on the air Saturdays and Sundays [6 p.m. to 1 a.m.],” Davis said. “It seemed like a good opportunity.”

Davis was on the air for ESPN Radio in its third week of existence in 1992 and has been there ever since.

“It was a good fit because I’d left WRKO in 1982 to go to work for an all-sports station in Avon, Conn., called Enterprise Radio, which was started up by the guy who created ESPN, but it went broke and I went back to WRKO,” he said.

Davis has become known as much for his interplay with former ESPN show host Tony Kornheiser during the “20-minute” and “40-minute” updates as he has for his easy delivery of the latest sports news, scores and transactions.

“I hope that lasts. I sort of developed that when I was working with Tony and he kept making a lot of comments during my updates,” said Davis, who also handled Boston College radio play-by-play calling for 10 years – a tenure highlighted by his call of one of college football’s greatest plays, the Hail Mary pass from Doug Flutie to Gerard Phelan that gave the Eagles a dramatic 47-45 victory over Miami on Nov. 23, 1984.

It took Davis awhile to reach a comfort level with the Washington Post columnist.

“It was kind of awkward at first. I mean, I’m trying to give the scores and this guy is interrupting me,” Davis laughed. “It took me about two months to get comfortable, but I think we both got to know and respect each other more because of it.”

Davis still has interplay with late-morning host Colin Cowherd and afternoon man Dan Patrick, but not to the same extent he had with Kornheiser, who left the show in March to focus on his other ventures.

“We’re working on it,” Davis said. “I’d call it a comfortable relationship.”