It’s the year of Caitlin Clark and Angel Reese, of Simone Biles and Katie Ledecky — a year when T-shirts declaring “Everyone Watches Women’s Sports” are seemingly everywhere. 

This sudden shift in the sports landscape was actually years in the making. And while behind-the-scenes momentum behind the scenes has been far more gradual, industry leaders are hopeful this year of women in the game will help spark further change. 

“There’s so much momentum around women’s sports right now and I’m a big believer that all ships rise together, so there’s real opportunity here,” Women Leaders in Sports CEO Patti Phillips said. “We really want to leverage this momentum to create change for good — we need women in the room where decisions are being made.” 

Still, Phillips believes that while change is happening, it’s the pace that is lagging. “It has been a slow go and there are a lot of things that aren’t said publicly,” she said. “But if you heard honestly from women about their life working in sports, it’s not good. While there are more men who are allies and who are becoming aware of unconscious bias, there’s still a long way to go. The culture still is not where it should be.”

Mountain West Conference commissioner Gloria Nevarez, the first Hispanic commissioner in NCAA Division I history, agreed. “You see a lot more women in the pipeline but not at the top echelons,” Nevarez said. “I can’t tell you how many times a job opens and the media riffs about a list of potential candidates but they don’t even include a woman. In the job, softer skills — collaboration, building consensus, coming at issues with humility — are an asset, but we aren’t getting in the interview pool and when we do there are inherent historical biases. There’s just a long way to go.” 

Still, the younger generation is more optimistic. “I definitely have not faced as many challenges as my peers in the past,” said Jill Schwartz, marketing manager for FAST Studio Streaming Networks, which includes the fledgling Women’s Sports Network. 

Added Courtney Stockmal, who directs football and soccer games for Fox Sports, “In the 15 years I’ve been in the industry it has definitely changed.”

NFL Network senior director Sara Ries agreed. “Now there are so many jobs for women,” she said, which was not true when she graduated college in 2005. 

And as they ascend the ladder, these younger women are mindful of reaching back. “As you grow in a company and have more of an influence and more of a voice, you can speak up,” NBC Sports senior producer Alexa Pritting said. “Making workplaces more inclusive is such a huge priority for me.” (As lead producer of the Paralympics, Pritting emphasizes diversity efforts toward other underrepresented communities, particularly people with disabilities.)

“Representation matters,” she added. “If you see somebody else doing the job that you want, then you know that it’s available to you.” 

More Than Just a Game 

This year may be remembered for the achievements of Biles, Ledecky, Clark and Reese, but there’s another woman seeking to be a game-changer at a totally different level. Vice President Kamala Harris’s presidential campaign represents the chance to shatter the ultimate glass ceiling. And that, Nevarez and Phillips said, could have an impact that goes beyond politics to the sports and media worlds. 

Any time a woman is elevated into any leadership role, it encourages girls and women to pursue their dreams in any and every field. “That would have a ripple effect over generations quicker than anything else could,” Nevarez said. 

Colie Edison
Chief Growth Officer, WNBA

KEY STATS: This position was created for Edison, who started in early 2022. She oversees all revenue generating business operations: corporate sponsorships, media partnerships, digital products, business development and bringing in new partners, app upgrades, sports betting and merchandising. Edison is particularly proud of a recent deal adding used car retailer  CarMax to the “Changemaker” roster of top sponsors that get more involved in the league. 

“This year I’ve seen more demand from the fans and the corporate partnership
side,” she said of the Caitlin Clark and Angel Reese phenomenon. “We can’t keep our merch in stock.”  

VARSITY STATUS: Edison joined Bowlero Corp. as VP of marketing in 2013 before becoming chief customer officer in 2017; two years later she began simultaneously working as CEO of the Professional Bowlers Association (the first female CEO in PBA history), where she landed a new partnership with Fox Sports. 

“I was as good a bowler as I am a basketball player — for basketball in fourth grade, I was voted MVP, which was Most Valuable Passer, because whenever I got the ball, I would just pass it to somebody else,” said Edison, whose high bowling score is 133. “I have always been in love with the business of sports and how to elevate niche or emerging sports and leagues and bring them to the next level.” 

IN HER OWN WORDS: “I grew up watching Knicks games with my father, and I was able to take him to Knicks playoff games as he turned 70 and was going through remission of a cancer treatment, which was the proudest moment of my life. This job didn’t exist when I was starting out but I had my passion for sports and entertainment mixed with my salesmanship and my revenue generating capabilities. I also had this drive to elevate the underdog. And I’ve always been a fan of basketball and female empowerment and encouraging women to strive for what they believe in and to never let anybody else set limitations for them. This league allows me to bring those passions to life in a way that has such a big impact on so many people.” 

Gloria Nevarez
Commissioner, Mountain West Conference

KEY STATS: Nevarez became commissioner of the Mountain West in 2023, focusing on revenue and distribution while also keeping the conference united and “maintaining our position in the NCAA ecosystem,” she said. 

Nevarez must build consensus among a majority of her constituents, whether they are university board members, athletic directors or coaches. “Right now we are all aligned and rowing in the same direction with a common vision with our most recent contracts,” said Nevarez, who is also president of Women Leaders in Sports.

VARSITY STATUS: In her previous role as commissioner of the West Coast Conference, Nevarez became the first Hispanic-American to lead an NCAA Division I conference. She had previously worked at senior levels in the administration of the Pac-12 Conference and at the University of Oklahoma, the University of California, Berkeley and San Jose State University. She attended the University of Massachusetts on a student-athlete scholarship for basketball and then earned a law degree from Berkeley. 

IN HER OWN WORDS: “While in law school I did an externship with the school’s athletic compliance folks and it was the first time I had really thought about how you can use a legal background. I went into labor litigation, thinking I could get into pro sports that way, but I came sniffing back around colleges and became San Jose State’s first full-time compliance person. I took a 50% pay cut. My parents said, ‘What are you doing?’ But I got to build a program from scratch. I wasn’t thinking about becoming a commissioner, I was just so thrilled to be in sports and in such a new field. I didn’t really have aspirations of leadership until I got to the WCC the first time and started serving on national committees and saw a pathway.” 

Patti Phillips
CEO, Women Leaders in Sports

KEY STATS: Since Phillips took over in 2010, Women Leaders in Sports has experienced triple-digit growth in membership while attendance at its national convention has grown by 250%. She oversees the organization’s leadership events and programs, including podcasts for career advancement for women.

“We prepare and position women to work and lead in sports,”Phillips said, adding that the organization is seeking to “leverage the momentum happening right now around women’s sports. Everyone is into women’s sports right now, which is awesome. But no one’s talking about women working and leading in sports and that’s where we come in.”

Phillips also created and leads the Women Leaders Performance Institute, a development program for all business industries, designed through the lens of sports.

VARSITY STATUS: Phillips took over as CEO in 2010 when the organization was the National Association of Collegiate Women Athletic Administrators. She led the shift to focus on advancing women into leadership positions; she eventually helped rebrand the organization in 2017 as Women Leaders in College Sports before expanding its purview with the current title last year. She said 80% of the group’s members are still in the collegiate space, but they now work with the NFL and their women’s program, with the LPGA and with several NWSL teams. 

Phillips made her name coaching basketball and volleyball at Ottawa University in Kansas, remaking a losing basketball program into a nationally ranked one. Then she worked for the NCAA as the CHAMPS/Life Skills program coordinator. She was also color analyst for collegiate women’s basketball and volleyball. Phillips spent 11 years as executive director of the Women’s Intersport Network in Kansas City, a nonprofit focusing on leadership development in girls and women through participation in sports.

IN HER OWN WORDS: The NACWAA was an advocacy group that was writing letters saying, “we don’t like this or that,” but it had lost the energy and focus for what was needed so I wasn’t interested in the job initially. But I saw potential in women coming together to have a voice, so we rebuilt with the idea of women helping women so we changed our mission statement from an advocacy organization to a leadership organization. We’ve become a career leadership and career strategy organization. We advocate by advancing leaders. 

Alexa Pritting
Senior Producer, NBC Sports

KEY STATS: Pritting oversees the network’s coverage of the Paralympic Games and produces NBC’s Olympics figure skating and gymnastics broadcasts. She is also a producer on many national and world championships, such as the U.S. Figure Skating Championships. She has won four Sports Emmy Awards.

VARSITY STATUS: A competitive figure skater in high school, Pritting later studied broadcast journalism at Syracuse University. After briefly working at ESPN as a figure-skating researcher, she joined NBC for the 2008 Torino Winter Olympics. This year marks her 10th Olympics and sixth Paralympics. She has been overseeing Paralympics coverage since 2017.

IN HER OWN WORDS: “This is just a dream job and it keeps growing and getting better. When I went to Syracuse, I was a little burned out from figure skating and looking for a fresh start where no one knew me as that figure-skating girl. But then when the 2008 NBC Torino Olympic internship came around, Molly Solomon, who’s now my boss, asked if I knew about any of the sports being covered. I actually thought, ‘Should I say it?’ But I did tell them. My initial intent was to get as far away as possible and then it sucked me back in.  But I loved it and wanted to go to as many Olympics as I could. It will never cease to be exciting. And overseeing the Paralympic productions has been invigorating.  It still has so much potential and I want to apply everything I’ve learned at the Olympics to growing the Paralympics. There is just so much we need to do still on that property.” 

Sara Ries
Senior Director, NFL Network

KEY STATS: Since ascending to senior director in 2022, Ries has taken on more responsibilities for big-picture planning. “I’m doing more on the creative side of planning larger events, like the remotes we put together for international games and relaunching Good Morning Football, which was previously in New York, for the West Coast,” she said. 

But her proudest achievement has been her contributions to the new NFL Media studio in Inglewood, California. “We really got a chance to design a studio from the ground up, laying out sets and stages,” Ries said.

VARSITY STATUS: Ries joined NFL Network in 2006 after one year as an anchor/reporter for KQTV St. Joseph, Missouri (known as KQ2), after graduating from Syracuse University’s Newhouse School. She’d been inspired in high school by a local sports reporter who spoke to her class. “I thought, ‘This is not a real job,’ ” she recalled. “I thought I’d have to be in a cubicle 9 to 5.”

While she initially presumed she’d pursue a career in front of the camera, her time at KQTV   — “putting on makeup in five minutes in the van, pulling the camera, getting a four-minute hit and being done for the night” — quickly lost its appeal. 

At NFL Network, she was drawn to the energy and excitement of the control room. “I wanted to be calling the shots,” she said. After three years as a production assistant, she rose to senior associate director and then, in 2014, she became a director. Ries was promoted to her current title in 2022. 

IN HER OWN WORDS: “As a senior director, I get to do more hiring and make more decisions about the people coming into our building. As you come up the ladder, you have more of a voice and can say, ‘Maybe we aren’t casting our net wide enough.’ I think we’re doing a better job at being very concerted in our efforts now. That’s been a big push in our production department. When you bring those voices into the room, women and minorities who weren’t getting the chance but who are super-qualified, that feels awesome.” 

Jill Schwartz
Marketing Manager, FAST Studios Streaming Networks

KEY STATS: Schwartz’s portfolio at FAST Studios includes the Women’s Sports Network (the first 24/7 streaming network dedicated to women’s sports); Team USA TV, the official Team USA free ad-supported TV (FAST) channel; and Racing America.
She designs all marketing materials, including presentations, sales one-sheets, channel key art, tune-in graphics, CTV billboard campaigns and additional branding assets, and works with the sales team to execute request for proposal (RFP) decks for brand partnerships. As lead designer in deck proposals she helped land high-profile sponsors in 2023, including Michelob Ultra, Frito-Lay and State Farm. “We’re really seeing the growth of these leagues,” Schwartz said. “We now have 17 league partners with the Women’s Sports Network, which is really exciting.” 

VARSITY STATUS: Since graduating from Emerson College, Schwartz has worked in marketing, publicity and creative services at Allied Global Marketing, DistroTV and B2+: The Custom Content Company.

IN HER OWN WORDS: “I always wanted to find the center between art and business, and marketing is kind of that sweet spot. I love to do art on the side, and I just felt like it was a really creative industry to get into. I didn’t follow a ton of sports growing up, but jumping into the FAST space, I became more of a fan and it has been quite a journey. Working for a start-up means having a really hands-on job and wearing a dozen hats, learning about everything from channel development to content production. Launching our first signature studio show, which is kind of the women’s version of SportsCenter, was incredibly exciting and I was on set every day watching the production, which was led by a women-driven team of producers, hosts and editors. It really became a groundbreaking initiative.” 

Becky Somerville
Senior Director of Production, FanDuel TV

KEY STATS: Somerville joined FanDuel TV (formerly TVG) in 2017 as senior producer, which led to her current job. She oversees horse-racing content for FanDuel TV, running the production of content and managing teams both behind and in front of the camera. 

VARSITY STATUS: Somerville grew up loving horses. “I started out watching horse racing on TV with my mom,” she said. “Then a racetrack opened in Minnesota, not far from where I lived, and I went out there and completely caught the bug. I wanted to be a jockey but got too big so I went to the racetrack industry program at the University of Arizona.”

While working as an assistant trainer at Santa Anita Park, she was given a shot as on-air talent for HRTV. Knowing that life on the back side of the track was limited and led to burnout, she seized the chance. She later moved into production and worked as both producer and talent for several years. 

IN HER OWN WORDS: “My former boss at HRTV saw potential in me. They had done a feature on me when I was an assistant trainer and she loved the way that I looked on camera. I would never have seen it — when I was in school, I was nervous giving speeches, you would hear my voice tremble, but you just take a leap of faith. I like being on the production side more. But I had no idea how TV was put together and had to learn everything from scratch. But I have a rounded experience and can see the race from the viewer’s side, the industry side and the gambler’s side, and felt like I was the one who could pull it all together. I still do get to go to the big races and I can still go and pet horse noses any time I want.”

Courtney Stockmal
Lead Director, Fox NFL Kickoff, Fox Sports 

KEY STATS: In recent years, Stockmal has been the director for Fox NFL Kickoff, Fox’s Super Bowl pregame and postgame, the FIFA Women’s World Cup and World Cup, plus MLB on Fox, Fox College Football and other shows. 

“One of my proudest moments in the last five years was being part of the Super Bowl pregame show in Miami in 2020,” Stockmal said. “But the 2022 World Cup in Qatar was one of the most difficult projects we could ever do — trying to do television in the Middle East with a crew that spoke a different language, had a different religion and outlook, while we were moving an entire American production halfway across the world. But our team just knocked it out of the park.” 

Stockmal also cited her work with virtual-reality sets for recent soccer tournaments as a rewarding project; she produced 200 hours of live programming over 30 days. “The only real things were the talent and the desk that they sat at,” she said. “Everything else was completely created on a computer screen and it’s never been done before.” 

VARSITY STATUS: Stockmal joined Fox Sports in 2013 and, as an associate director, worked on the 2015 World Series, Super Bowl and World Cup.  While working at Fox Sports, Stockmal has also freelanced as an associate director for The Ellen DeGeneres Show and Entertainment Tonight. She also worked on the 2016 and 2020 Olympics for NBC.

IN HER OWN WORDS: “I was an elite swimmer growing up and I knew I wanted to do something in sports, maybe medicine or psychology. My dad married a local news anchor and in high school she took me to work and I got to see behind the scenes of how TV worked. My eyes lit up and it was like the angels were singing, I had found what I needed to do.”

Women have made undeniable progress in the worlds of sports and media in the last 20 years, as B+C Multichannel News has chronicled partly through these annual profiles of female leaders in the televised sports world, Women in the Game. But though steady, progress has been slow, although there was a greater change in attitude and tangible improvements after #MeToo burst into the headlines. 

One silver lining in the tragic and destructive pandemic has been the change in the way America goes to work, and there’s hope that this could bring greater progress for women in sports and sports media. “There are women talking sports now on TV and online every day as hosts, analysts, play-by-play announcers and reporters and they’re no longer exceptions,” Jodi Logsdon, VP of news and editorial for CBS Sports, said. “We’ve seen the change behind the scenes too. When I started, women tended to be in certain roles in marketing or operations and not in an editorial or production capacity, but that has changed.”

Roles, Attitudes Changing

Best of all, Logsdon said, there’s been a shift in attitude, so women and people of color are no longer being hired just for show or to meet a quota. “There’s now a recognition of the fact that having those different perspectives and truly hearing them and engaging them is not just the right thing to do but it’s also actually making us better,” she said. “Women and people of color bring different ideas and cover stories in different ways and appeal to broader audiences with stories that reflect them.”

That said, resistance can be tough to break down. Stephanie Medina, director of Fox NFL Sunday, said Fox Sports has brought in another woman director and has a third in training but “an agent told me that until two years ago there were other networks that didn’t even want the names of female directors on their lists of people to see.”

Meredith Battin, VP of content planning and programming for the National Football League, who was often the only woman in the room when she was starting out, said improvements have been slowest to hit at the most senior levels. “The changes over the course of my career have been tremendous,” she said.

“Change doesn’t happen overnight, but things look a lot different today for women in the field than they did 10 years ago,” agreed Karen Brodkin, who is co-head of WME Sports and executive VP of content strategy and development at Endeavor. She said there still needs to be more effort made to get women (and people of color) into the pipeline so that when hiring happens, there are more candidates. “I’m hopeful our agents and executives will look a lot more like our clients moving forward,” she said. “We’re certainly not there yet but we’re creating opportunities.”

Years ago, Battin said, the challenge was just about getting women in the door. Now it’s about finding ways to support working mothers. “The pandemic showed that people don’t have to always be in the office and there can be more flexibility for parents,” she said. While sports-related jobs are often going to require work on nights and weekends, “this is the positive for women that has come out of the pandemic,” Battin said.

Rosalyn Durant, executive VP of programming and acquisitions for ESPN, said leadership needs to “support people for their full selves, to be flexible as leaders to meet people’s needs so they can be successful.” 

Kat Harwood, a principal in Deloitte Consulting LLP’s sports-industry practice, said the pandemic produced a seismic change but workplaces are “reaching an inflection point” as companies start to mandate more days back in the office. While it will take time to sort out what works best for companies and employees, she said, there’s no going back to the rigidity of the past — and women will be the beneficiaries of this paradigm shift. 

Paying It Forward

She credits the women who came before her for helping break down barriers and push for change, adding that her generation has done the same. “There’s a sense among women in the field of banding together, of providing wrap-around support and pulling through the next group to pay it forward,” Harwood said. “Now we’re getting a multiplier effect for those efforts.”

Added Brodkin, “I hope we’ve left a strong legacy for the women who come up behind us.” 

When asked when progress would reach the point of true equality, Durant said: “I don’t know that I’ll ever get to answer that question and say, ‘It’s enough,’ though I hope I do one day. We have to continue focusing on it and intentionality, and acknowledge where there are gaps — then we can make sure women get support and truly get the same opportunities.” 

Meredith Battin 
VP, Content Planning and Programming, National Football League

KEY STATS: “My role has changed every few years,” Battin said. In recent years, she has overseen a team of more than 40 in portfolio-level planning and investment operations. She’s now helping bring together the content for linear and digital platforms, which is a shift driven by the need to reach more fans. Battin is responsible for everything from YouTube content to podcasts as the NFL strives to reach fans where they are. “We’re planning and programming with all the platforms in mind,” she said. “That’s an exciting shift.” 

VARSITY STATUS: Battin started out in the business world at American Express but wanted a job she felt passionate about. So she earned an MBA from UCLA to prepare for a career in the sports world. Battin graduated just as the NFL was launching its digital business and jumped in right away. She has been with the league for nearly 17 years, starting as a product manager for NFL Digital Media and taking on increasing responsibility across new areas since then. Her previous title was VP of business operations and club media. 

IN HER OWN WORDS: “I’ve had the great fortune to try my hand in all sorts of things in the media space. When I started we had a website and that was it, and now that’s not even the most interesting thing we do: there’s YouTube, podcasts, FAST [channels]. We want to get more content to more people and make things more accessible. 

“It’s a lot of work to rethink how we do our planning and how we bring our groups together. We have to figure out different strategies around our events: what content goes where and how to maximize our reach. We’re doing that in a resource-constrained world with more platforms, so you have to be smarter, more efficient, more creative. I like being able to pair what each platform brings to the table from a strategic value and from the fan’s value and put the full picture together. I see things holistically.”

Karen Brodkin
Co-Head of WME Sports and Executive VP of Content Strategy and Development, Endeavor

KEY STATS: Brodkin is, with Josh Pyatt, the co-head of WME Sports, which encompasses the agency’s representation of athletes, broadcasters, coaches and front-office personnel. She also leads business development and strategy for a range of business areas across the Endeavor portfolio, including partnerships with sports leagues, federations, conferences and teams; content licensing; strategy and development; media strategy and consultation; sports naming rights and venue programming, strategy and development; and eSports partnerships and events. “In the throes of the pandemic from 2020 to 2022, while we were working from home, we built a football business, a basketball representation business, a basketball coaching business and a Major League Baseball representation business,” Brodkin said. 

VARSITY STATUS: Brodkin started as a corporate attorney specializing in labor and employment matters, then spent five years as an entertainment attorney at two Los Angeles-based entertainment firms where her clients included Garth Brooks, Spike Lee, Warner Bros. and New Line Cinema. 

IN HER OWN WORDS: “I thought I had one of the best jobs in the world at Fox until I got recruited to come here in 2014, leaving legal business affairs behind to come in as a true dealmaker and help on strategy. My skills are in building and nurturing relationships. I’m a good manager of people and good at strategically building out a business. 

“I also think a lot about culture. I want the brand of WME Sports to stand for something culturally, and if we have the right culture internally that will resonate externally with clients and signing efforts. I’m not sure if there are any other sports agencies run or co-run by women, and there are no other media advisory businesses featuring two women at the top.” 

Rosalyn Durant
Executive VP, Programming and Acquisitions, ESPN

KEY STATS: Durant returned to The Walt Disney Co.-controlled ESPN in March 2023 after three years as senior VP of Disney Springs, Water Parks and ESPN Wide World of Sports. In her new role, she leads programming and media rights deals for all ESPN platforms. 

VARSITY STATUS: Prior to her three years in Florida, Durant spent two decades at ESPN, starting as an intern in affiliate sales and marketing in 1998. She signed on full-time in 1999 as a marketing coordinator and rose through the ranks. By 2005, she was senior director for national accounts and the following year she moved into programming as a senior director. Since then she has been VP, programming and acquisitions, managing the network’s relationships with the NBA, Major League Soccer, FIFA and other organizations, as well as VP of college sports programming and acquisitions, overseeing all of ESPN’s college sports relationships, rights acquisitions and programming, and senior VP of ESPN’s College Networks.

IN HER OWN WORDS: “I am back. ESPN is home. Even when I was at Walt Disney World, every week I’d talk to someone from ESPN — a friend or someone reaching out for advice or someone else — just to stay connected with the business. So returning here felt like a natural next step. 

“I’m back in the department I spent the majority of my time at ESPN in. I know the team here and understand the work that’s in front of us. We need a disciplined approach to acquisitions and content in order to find the right mix that will help
us broaden our reach to fans. It could be men’s or women’s sports, traditional or non-traditional, amateur, college or pro: It’s not one thing but the right mix. We want to round out the portfolio, not get sidetracked by all of the noise around us and focus on what we do well.” 

Kat Harwood
Principal, Sports Industry Practice, Deloitte Consulting LLP

KEY STATS: Harwood joined Deloitte’s sports consultancy not long after it began eight years ago. She advises those in the industry on how to maximize value from digital enablement opportunities across all aspects of their operations, from improving the fan experience to generating new revenue streams. 

“At first we were building awareness, but now we have strong partnerships and clients, so we are leveraging that and we can get more folks answering our calls,” she said. “We’re also showing them what we are doing outside of sports that has applicability inside sports.” 

Harwood’s group does consulting with the Olympics and others but is “really proud of the investment and impact we’ve had on a lot of women’s sports leagues like the NWSL, WNBA and the women’s U.S. soccer team.”

VARSITY STATUS: Harwood has spent her entire career at Deloitte. While tailgating at a football game during college at UCLA, she met an alum who connected her with the company. An internship led to a full-time job, starting as an auditor in the aerospace and defense industry. She then got an MBA from Wharton. “Business school helped me broaden my knowledge across all aspects of running a business, which was important if I wanted to be a consultant,” she said, adding that she purposely studied sports business while getting her graduate degree. “That became the foundation for a totally different career at Deloitte.” 

IN HER OWN WORDS: “The experience I’m most proud of is a program we started last year called The Student Athlete Leadership Experience, presented by and in conjunction with Deloitte Foundation. It’s often hard for student-athletes to understand how the skills in their sports translate into the business world and how to get in the door. We’ve doubled the number of participants this year, to eight schools and 50 student-athletes. We help them build a community of like-minded people and Deloitte folks donate their time, giving an introduction to business courses or doing interview prep and other things like that. I got to ideate the concept, pitch it and find the funding. Seeing it come together was one of the most genuinely inspiring things I’ve done.”

Tammy Henault
Chief Marketing Officer, National Basketball Association

KEY STATS: Henault joined the NBA last November to head the global marketing efforts for the league and its affiliate leagues. She also is a leader in overseeing the NBA’s new Next Gen platform, working with the product and content teams on the reimagined NBA App and on NBA ID, the league’s new global membership program offering fans benefits and rewards.

VARSITY STATUS: Henault spent her career in direct-to-consumer marketing, first at magazines like People and Time and then at The New York Times as it began moving toward the digital age. She then worked for CBS and finally Paramount Global, where she managed a team of more than 150 employees responsible for brand, partnership and performance marketing as well as audience development, customer acquisition and retention. She oversaw marketing for more than 100 movies and TV shows, including Star Trek: Discovery and 1883 and also for the global launch of Paramount Plus.

IN HER OWN WORDS: “At the magazines and The New York Times, I lived the transformation from print to digital. With The Times, we were shifting from free consumption to pay and trying to stay ahead of the curve. It was an incredible experience to launch a whole new model for an industry. I left Paramount for the NBA because it is such a global powerhouse of a brand, with such a passionate fan base, which makes it a dream to work for. There are a lot of synergies from a content and media perspective and I thought my background could add value.

“I’m still learning a ton about our fans and the different audience types, who’s a viewer on linear and who’s on streaming. I’ll have the ‘new’ CMO attached to my title until I’ve gone through a full NBA season.” 

Jodi Logsdon
VP, News and Editorial, CBS Sports

KEY STATS: Logsdon is responsible for editorial operations, newsgathering and research across platforms, serving as the lead editorial voice guiding CBS Sports productions. She also partners with leaders and other contributors to ensure CBS Sports’s high standards for news and reporting are met in all coverage across studio, game and digital productions. She also directs editorial operations for CBS Sports HQ and oversees the CBSSports.com editorial content division. Under her leadership, the research teams use data and statistics to enhance storytelling across productions and the News & Assignment Desk guides the reporting and presentation of breaking news and compelling developments across platforms. Logsdon also manages the CBS Sports Race & Culture Unit, which revolves around storytelling at the intersection of sports, race, identity and culture, and is the primary liaison for editorial coordination with CBS News.

VARSITY STATUS: A two-time Sports Emmy Award winner, Logsdon came to CBS Sports in 2015 after 12 years at ESPN. She had started as a news and copy editor for ESPN.com, eventually overseeing the daily news­gathering operation that supported ESPN’s studio productions. While there she was a contributor to ESPN’s Diversity & Inclusion Priority Team. She also was an inaugural member of the CBS Sports Inclusivity Advisory Council.

IN HER OWN WORDS: “I came to CBS Sports because they hadn’t had a dedicated news and editorial person on the TV side and were just creating the role, so I was able to design it. They envisioned it as an individual contributor to cover everything. I started as an individual contributor, a singular voice focused on the news that must be addressed in our coverage. In the years since, I have built and enhanced multiple teams dedicated to informing our storytelling, our productions and, by extension, our audiences. A few years in, I also took over our two research teams, one for broadcast and one for cable, and merged them together. Now we’ve undertaken a larger effort across all CBS Sports to integrate all our digital teams more closely with linear networks and all editorial will be under me. 

“For the editorial integration project we started this past spring I draw from experience I’ve gained at various stops along the course of my career, harnessing the lexicon learned in my tenure at ESPN.com and flexing the muscles I remember from my days with the ESPN news and assignment desk and as a coordinating producer on ESPNews. As we embark on our biggest college football season yet, and march toward our broadcast of Super Bowl LVIII, I’m humbled to know that the ever-growing news, research, editorial and Race & Culture teams I’ve built, and continue to build, serve to uplift the depth and breadth of that coverage.”

Stephanie Medina
Director, ‘Fox NFL Sunday,’ Fox Sports 

KEY STATS: For 2022, Medina oversaw a major overhaul at Fox NFL Sunday as the pregame show got a new set, control room, cameras and graphics system. “This felt like a new beginning, and I got to lead that,” the Emmy Award-winning director said. “It was challenging because I needed to learn the technology and incorporate it without losing what is the core of our show, those five guys at the desk.” 

VARSITY STATUS: Medina joined Fox as an associate director for the network’s Major League Baseball and NFL pregame shows in 2003. She directed the network’s Bowl Championship Series pregame coverage in 2006 and 2007, as well as MLB pregame shows in 2008 and 2009 and the pregame show for Super Bowl LI. She began as director of Fox NFL Sunday at the start of the 2013-14 season and made her Super Bowl debut at Super Bowl XLVIII in 2014. “No other women were getting to direct like this and some people didn’t want me to get the job, but producer Bill Richards and [Fox Sports CEO] Eric Shanks gave me this opportunity.”

IN HER OWN WORDS: “I was a news junkie at a young age and then on a field trip in eighth grade we went to see the working of a TV studio and I saw the chaos and the yelling and the monitors and it was like the angels started singing. It was like nirvana for me. 

“I was the first in my family to go to college. I majored in communications and just wanted to get into TV production — I liked the live crazy element — but I knew no one in the business. I realized my only way in was internships. I worked my butt off at an internship at KTLA [Los Angeles] and soon after they called me because they needed help on the assignment desk. I kept getting calls, to help in graphics or to load the tape. When people would quit, I’d fall in. I got to be assistant director on their early news show, and then their main one and then I became director. It took a good eight years to get from working for free to directing.” 

Gina DiGioia Sheldon
Chief Legal Officer, Fubo

KEY STATS: Sheldon was Fubo’s first in-house legal hire, joining just before the company listed on the New York Stock Exchange. She built Fubo’s legal team and became the company’s first chief legal officer. Sheldon now leads all legal matters for Fubo, including financing, acquisitions and corporate governance. On the executive management team, Sheldon helps shape Fubo’s internal legal function and helps define the company’s strategy.

Sheldon closed two acquisitions to expand Fubo’s global footprint and tech capabilities: Edisn.ai, an AI-powered computer vision technology firm based in Bangalore, India, aimed at creating a more interactive and immersive live TV and sports viewership experience, and live TV streaming company Molotov SAS in France, which reaches nearly 4 million monthly active users in Europe. She also headed the legal proceedings at home for carriage agreements at regional sports networks, including Altitude Sports in 10 Rocky Mountain states and with Sinclair Broadcast Group to bring the Bally Sports-branded regional sports networks to Fubo, making the streamer home to more than 35 regional sports networks.

Sheldon also was involved with rights deals, including an exclusive year-long partnership with former NFL player Shawne Merriman’s Lights Out Xtreme Fighting MMA league and a multiyear renewal with NBA All-Star Gilbert Arenas for his series No Chill. She also oversees patent filings for proprietary technology that will differentiate the Fubo streaming platform.

VARSITY STATUS: Sheldon began her career as an apprentice with the State Department at the U.S. Embassy in Rome. She then went to law school hoping to get involved with international transactional work. After working for small firms, she spent 17 years at Alloy Inc. and Alloy Digital, working on media deals, mergers and acquisitions and e-commerce. “I like to say I grew up at Alloy,” she said. 

IN HER OWN WORDS: “I joined Fubo because my sweet spot is working with growth-stage companies and Fubo had just gone through a merger and was growing and looking to do an IPO. I love to be hands-on and dig in, working with an entrepreneurial managerial team. At a growth stage, you can have more of an impact because you’re not put in the box of just doing legal: There’s enough work to go around and I’m one of the more experienced folks here. There was a large learning curve, but I bring my experience into conversations and transactions. I’m not just thinking about just legal rights and clearances, but about dollars and long-term strategy. I’m looking at things holistically.”

Fifty years ago, America almost inadvertently transformed its future with the passage of Title IX, a piece of civil-rights legislation that prohibits sex-based discrimination in any school or any other education program that receives funding from the federal government. 

The most obvious result was tremendous growth in women’s sports. It encouraged girls to take up athletics in pursuit of college scholarships and eventually even professional opportunities. Less obvious was the impact Title IX had in paving the way for women, via their sports experiences, to succeed in business meetings and board rooms. 

To women now in leadership positions in sports and media — including those spotlighted here in B+C Multichannel News’s annual “Women in the Game” feature — Title IX undeniably helped shape their world.

“Title IX is everything; it was absolutely the foundation,” CAA Sports golf executive Megan Nicol said. She started down her career path because her father saw a newspaper ad saying that any girl at their high school who tried out for golf would get free lessons. “He said more college scholarships go unused for this sport than any other, so I started playing golf.”

Dana Jones, the NBA’s senior director, broadcast content management, co-captained and played goalkeeper for Columbia University’s varsity soccer team. She said the impact Title IX had is “hard to even put into words.”

“It was subconscious, but travel soccer built my leadership skills and teamwork,” she said. “As a goalkeeper, communication is key and you also have to develop a tough skin. Plus at tournaments, we’d stay at homes of other players, which taught me to deal with diverse groups of people. So now it’s effortless to deal with anyone, from ushers to team presidents.”

Carol Stiff spent 31 years at ESPN and is now an adviser to the fledgling Women’s Sports Network. Before that, though, she took her Title IX opportunities further than most. At Southern Connecticut State University, she played basketball and field hockey, before going on to coach basketball at Brown University, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and Western Connecticut State University. (She’s in the Women’s Basketball Hall of Fame.)

“Title IX gave me the opportunity to compete on and off the court and in the boardrooms,” she said. “Sports taught me how to lose and how to be a leader of a team.”

Title IX kept having an impact once Stiff was a parent. When her high-school-age daughter said she couldn’t stay after school for geometry help because her soccer team was being bused to a field across town, Stiff’s first question was, “Where does the boys’ team practice?” They were practicing right in back of the school, so Stiff taught her daughter about Title IX violations and used the law to ensure that every other week the boys would have to ship out while the girls stayed put. “Otherwise, the boys are getting a better education because they’re boys. Title IX demands equal access for my son and my daughter.” 

Even with Title IX, change was, of course, a long time coming in the workplace. Nikki Ambrifi, VP of client partnerships at FuboTV, recalled that at the first sporting event she attended as an account executive, all the men went to play golf and, as the only woman on the team, she was tasked with taking the wives to the spa. “Now I play golf all the time with my clients, so there has been a shift,” she said, adding that at the beginning of her career she’d be the only woman at staff lunches for 12, but now there are four. 

Stiff said there are more and more women in the production truck, in the rooms where decisions are made and in the top negotiations. 

Despite the gains, these leading women sports executives said there is more room for growth. Maria Soares, senior VP, production and content strategy for ESPN, said one thing that has changed is that people are more openly discussing the issue. 

“In the last five years there has begun a powerful conversation about the importance of giving women opportunities to make sure they have a voice at the table,” she said. “Years ago if you were the only woman in the room, you didn’t come out of the meeting and say this is a problem. It was just the way it was. Now it’s OK to talk about what we want the change to be and why that’s important.”

Fox Sports general counsel Elizabeth Casey sees the progress but said it’s important to not just measure progress in numbers. “The bigger issue is not how many women there are in the room but whether you’re respected and listened to and whether the men understand you might have a different viewpoint and take that in,” she said, adding that she learned to speak up because she had seven brothers. “We’re getting there.” 

NIKKI AMBRIFI
VP of Client Partnerships, FuboTV

KEY STATS: Nicole (Nikki) Ambrifi leads sponsorships and partnership sales for all Fubo brands, including FuboTV, Fubo Sports Network, Fubo Movie Network and Fubo Latino Network. Ambrifi works with the programming, content and business development teams executing new client partnerships and specializing in contextual and addressable targeting, creating unique and innovative multiplatform opportunities in the streaming space. 

Last year, when FuboTV acquired the exclusive live streaming rights to the Qatar World Cup 2022 Qualifying matches of South American Football Confederation (CONMEBOL), Ambrifi led efforts to secure multiple sponsors for English and Spanish content, including Michelob Ultra, Procter & Gamble’s Gillette, Patrón and Boost Mobile. Recently, she snagged Miller Lite as a presenting sponsor for the first match day of the UEFA Nations league for games that exclusively streamed on FuboTV. 

VARSITY STATUS: A native of Brooklyn, New York, Ambrifi started out working on the launch of Sports Illustrated for Kids. One favorite memory is of an ad integration with Pepsi, creating a mobile trailer that traveled around the country. “We had Shaq’s sneaker, size 22,” she said. “All anybody wanted was to put their foot in it.”

From there she moved to NBC Sports, working on events like the PGA Tour and U.S. Open tennis. Before coming to Fubo in 2019 she also worked for MTV Networks and spent a decade at Discovery Networks.

IN HER OWN WORDS: “When I came here in 2019, people were cutting cords and I felt fortunate to have this opportunity to bridge the gap into the world of streaming. We can sell a banner sponsorship on our homepage saying, ‘Watch football on Sundays, brought to you by…’ ” she explained. ”We provide valuable inventory not available elsewhere. Now others are launching streaming and big players are moving events behind streaming paywalls and selling their own sponsorships, which was part of our pitch.

“But right now we are one of only four players in the live TV streaming space and we’re the only one with a unique sports-focused audience. In addition to that we have first-party data. We are also moving into sportsbook and gaming and free-to-play interactive areas that no one else is doing and we can integrate our clients into all those areas.”

ELIZABETH CASEY
Executive VP & Deputy General Counsel of Fox Corp. and General Counsel of Fox Sports

KEY STATS: Elizabeth Casey came up at Fox as a litigator and had previously interacted with sports regularly. Since she was promoted to her new role in 2021, though, she spends 90% of her time on Fox Sports, getting involved in all aspects of business and strategies, from rights deals and renewals to international law for overseas events to legal issues with patents for the company’s internal developments. “We’re always innovating and I have to see what we can and can’t do and how we do things and make them work legally,” she said.

VARSITY STATUS:  A graduate of George Washington University Law School, Casey initially worked at Troop, Meisinger, Steuber & Pasich, involved in civil litigation for financial institutions and entertainment studios. She rose through the ranks to become a partner at the firm before joining Fox in 1999 as VP of litigation. In 2021, she was promoted to her current position. 

IN HER OWN WORDS: “It’s the best job I’ve ever had, but to say it was drinking out of a fire hose when I started last fall is an understatement. When I came in, we were launching a brand new football league in less than six months with the new USFL. That was something new for me but also for Fox, which has never launched or owned a football league. Everybody just pitched in to get all the legal work done. But also everybody involved in USFL pitched in to do anything they could and it felt great to help in other areas although my expertise is obviously in the legal arena. 

“It’s been a great experience and now we’re doing a wind-down, but then we’re heading into next season and the USFL is still new enough that there’s a lot of growing we’re going to do. And then there was the NFL and the MLB All-Star Game and postseason and doing the FIFA World Cup at a different time of year [than usual] halfway around the world in Qatar.” 

KAREN GANJAMIE
VP, Broadcast Operations & Network Origination,
MLB Network 

KEY STATS: Ganjamie is one of the few women vice presidents in the sports industry who concentrates on managing technical areas. She successfully runs game-day operations for MLB Network’s partners such as YouTube and Apple TV Plus, which continue to innovate and showcase baseball to new and different fan bases. She is also part of the Emmy-winning team behind MLB Tonight.

VARSITY STATUS: Ganjamie spent four years at Oxygen Media, rising to director of broadcast and digital media operations. From there, she went to work in post-production at NBC before joining MLB Network in 2011 as manager of network origination. She was promoted to senior director in 2014 and then to her current position last year. 

IN HER OWN WORDS: “When you go into this industry, you don’t realize how many different roles there are, and operations wasn’t something I was aware of at all when I was in college or doing internships. I thought I was going to end up in advertising and only accidentally found myself in television. I had gone to Villanova for communications and I minored in psychology. The communications degree was only marginally helpful but the psychology minor is tremendously helpful in my day to day. My instincts were really good when it came to operations but it was also that the way I interact with people lent itself well to this role. I’m curious and want to have an understanding about what everybody does, and putting that puzzle together is what we do in operations. We make sure all the parties have what they need, giving people what they need in that moment to be successful. 

“I build relationships with partners like YouTube and Apple, working side by side with them in creating an experience for the viewer, coordinating with their team to make sure we have things like dynamic ad insertion and polls and figuring out the messaging and how we serve them so they can run the ads and the fans are getting pristine video and audio. We want a viewer experience that is technically beautiful.

“We can serve multiple partners with the same content, making sure we are able to give them the formats that work best in their specific environment. In this new era, one size does not fit all.”

KAREN JAIMES
VP of Creative and Post Production, Team Whistle

KEY STATS: Jaimes, a native of Colombia, joined Team Whistle three years ago. In her current role she manages and oversees all creative and post production for this digital entertainment and sports media company. An important part of her role is featuring female athletes from different backgrounds and from different places around the world. She just worked on “The Future Is Her,” an NFT collection aimed at empowering and elevating women in the sports world by creating 10 pieces of non-fungible token imagery that embody women in a variety of sports. Proceeds help purchase shoes for Bronx Storm, a nonprofit AAU youth basketball program for the academic and athletic growth of student-athletes.

VARSITY STATUS: Jaimes began her career as a graphic designer for Vanderbyl Design. She then worked as a designer for Design Theorem and as creative director for Medium.com and then Vertical Networks, which was acquired by Team Whistle. 

IN HER OWN WORDS: “As my role has changed, I am taking on more responsibilities, working with a wider group of people. I still work with my creatives, which is my background, but I’m also working with other parts of the organization. For our ‘Future is Her’ project, I collaborated during Women’s History Month with Natalie White, whose Moolah Kicks are the first shoes made exclusively for women basketball players. We featured her in one of our shows called My Hustle to share her story, and then we worked out that if anyone buys one of those NFTs they will get a pair of Moolah Kicks.” 

DANA JONES
Senior Director, Broadcast Content
Management, NBA 

KEY STATS: Jones is primary on-site liaison for NBA teams, arena contacts and national broadcast partners for all nationally televised games. She also oversees the production of ESPN and Turner Sports studio shows when they are on site at NBA arenas and manages and schedules the team that travels to coordinate nationally televised NBA games — a role she also performs for WNBA, NBA G League and international games.

VARSITY STATUS: While in pre-med studies at Columbia University — “my dream job was to be a team physician in the NBA or NFL” — Jones interned in production at HBO. That led to work at API Productions, which produced Major League Soccer games, before Jones joined the NBA as a logger and production assistant in 1997. “I thought I’d learn some things about production and the NBA and move on,” she said. Instead, she has stayed for a quarter of a century working her way up the ladder to coordinator and manager en route to her current job; along the way she has managed NBA game broadcasts on six continents and coordinated all broadcasts for 22 NBA Finals.

IN HER OWN WORDS: “Not only has our game expanded globally, but when I started doing this we only had to worry about radio and the national television partner at a game. Now, we’re managing ancillary programming and digital media and making sure everyone who has a stake in the game is getting what they need to display our game to the world in the best possible light. That’s a lot more people who I have to make sure are all playing nice in the sandbox. I’m a facilitator by nature so I really enjoy making sure everyone else can be at their best so our product is at its best. 

“We want to reach more fans, and the way fans consume our game is changing, but we don’t want to disrupt the purity and beauty of the game. Fans weren’t walking around watching games on their phones five years ago so now we have to find a camera angle that will make it look better for the guy who is watching on the phone on the train, not in front of his 70-inch TV on his couch.

MARTINA NAVRATILOVA
Analyst, Tennis Channel, and tennis legend

KEY STATS: “I leave my place in history to others,” Martina Navratilova said. “It’s difficult to talk about my achievements, though at the same time it’s funny how people forget.”If you have forgotten, here’s a history lesson: She won 59 Grand Slam titles, more than anyone in tennis’ Open era, which dates to 1969. That  includes 18 singles crowns (including a record nine at Wimbledon), tying her for third-most with  Chris Evert. She took home 31 women’s doubles titles and 10 mixed doubles titles. In 1984, she won 74 consecutive matches, a record no  one has broken.

VARSITY STATUS: The Czech-born star became a U.S. citizen in 1981; that year she lost millions of dollars in endorsements by coming out and has been outspoken for gay and LGBTQ+ rights ever since. She also speaks out on issues from abortion rights to gun violence to mass incarceration to freedom of speech. Navratilova announced for HBO, TNT and CBS after retiring in 1994. She rejoined the tour in 2000 but after stepping away for good in 2006, she signed on with Tennis Channel. “When I started I talked too much about technique and not enough about tactics and the emotional and mental stuff. I evolved from working with Bill Macatee, Brett Haber and Mary Carillo, who really helped me out.”

IN HER OWN WORDS: “Overall, the women playing today have more clout. There are more press conferences and more press coverage and they have a bigger voice just from social media. You have access to the world, which we didn’t have in my time. However, there have been instances at the tournaments, particularly the majors, where players have been told not to talk about certain topics or the press has been told that certain questions won’t be accepted, even though they are not about people’s personal lives and they directly affect the game. I don’t like that. These are global issues and sports and politics have always mixed. I don’t like anybody to be shut up. At least with social media, the players can be unfiltered and uncensored. And I envy that. 

“It has always been important to speak my mind. I left a country where you couldn’t do that, so when people tell me basically to ‘shut up and dribble,’ I say I didn’t leave one country to be told what to do in another. Being silent doesn’t change anything and silence is complicity. 

I wish people would speak out more on issues that don’t affect them personally, whether it’s a women’s right to choose or racism or denying people equal protection under the law. And still, men’s voices are more easily validated and women get attacked for saying the same thing that a man does. Yes, women have bigger voices today and there are many more women in positions of power, but we are still being attacked just because of our sex. And that pisses me off.” 

MEGAN NICOL
Executive, CAA Golf

KEY STATS: Nicol was promoted in 2020 to her current role overseeing all business development for CAA Golf. She helps oversee management of more than $75M in golf sponsorships annually and has worked with clients like Farmers Insurance, KPMG, Aon, UnitedHealth Group and T-Mobile. To boost women in sports, her team brought KPMG the opportunity to sponsor the first-ever women’s Major Championship in the PGA’s 100-year history. Her team also created the KPMG Women’s Leadership Summit, and she served on the board of We Are Golf, a coalition of organizations focused on increasing everyone’s access to be able to play golf. 

VARSITY STATUS: Nicol started at MG Sports Marketing immediately after college, working on representing major brands in golf. The company was acquired by CAA Sports in 2011. She has been at CAA Golf ever since, working first in New York as primary liaison with CAA Golf’s Jacksonville office and other parts of the agency, such as CAA Brand Consulting and Sports Property Sales. In 2017, she was appointed to CAA’s Global Fellows program, a leadership development program. She has since been part of CAA’s Women in Sports initiative, which strives to empower the next generation of women internally. She also took part in CAA’s assistant mentorship program.

IN HER OWN WORDS: “Once I was in a meeting for the Olympics with [Golf Channel executive producer] Molly Solomon and I didn’t say anything the whole time, I just sat there and took notes. Afterward, she took me aside and said, if you want to be invited back to these meetings you have to speak up and speak with a purpose and contribute. She said it much nicer than that but I took it to heart. Our group is 90% women but there are still certainly a ton of meetings where I’m the only woman. Now I take it as a challenge to make sure my voice is heard.”

PATTY POWER
Executive VP, Operations & Engineering, CBS Sports

KEY STATS: Overseeing management of operations and engineering involves Power in production management, technical management, network operations, commercial operations, post-production and media services for CBS Sports and CBS Sports Network’s broadcast and cable properties. Her responsibilities include technical production of remote, studio and original programming, as well as the distribution and quality control of CBS Sports Network’s signal, including affiliate authorization, compliance, network operations center and commercial operations. She also managed the buildout of a 20,000-square-foot production facility
at Chelsea Piers in New York City that included studio and post-production facilities and the CBS Sports Network’s upgrade to high-definition production programming and distribution.

VARSITY STATUS: Power has a long career in sports and television, working on the Summer Olympics for NBC Sports before building the operations and engineering department that launched Classic Sports Network and working for Major League Baseball Productions as vice president of operations. In that MLB job, she managed day-to-day operations of the production unit and managed the footage and licensing department and oversaw the buildout of MLB Productions’ 25,000 square-foot studio. 

IN HER OWN WORDS: “In recent years I’m most proud of navigating through the pandemic and all the COVID protocols while continuing to put on The Masters and our NFL games and a Super Bowl. We had to adjust, keeping everybody safe but also getting back out there. COVID forced us to innovate a lot more quickly than we would have. We had to figure out how to produce things like graphics and replays remotely. These days, we’re collaborating more with Paramount Plus for streaming and CBS Interactive for digital, which gives me opportunities to get involved beyond traditional cable and broadcast, which is where I’ve been most of my career.” 

MARIA SOARES
Senior VP, Production and Content Strategy, ESPN

KEY STATS: Soares was promoted to her current role in April, adding responsibility for the morning and afternoon editions of SportsCenter and ESPN’s universal news
group, which drives editorial decision-making, strategy and logistics across platforms. She also oversees content creation and distribution strategy for studio production, focusing on maximizing ESPN’s audience through strategic efforts, via SportsCenter, ESPN Plus, event production, digital, sport-specific studio shows and more.

VARSITY STATUS: Soares joined ESPN 30 years ago. She was graduating from Emerson College and the network was looking for someone interested in broadcasting, and fluent in Portuguese, to help launch a network in Brazil. (She was raised in the Azores and also speaks Spanish and English.) She spent the next 25 years working in the ESPN International and ESPN Deportes arenas, overseeing event production teams, studio programs, the digital video team, the global assignment desk, the talent office and some of the group’s biggest projects. She went on to help launch more than 10 ESPN networks, and provide video support to more than a dozen global ESPN.com editions. 

Soares is a member of ESPN’s D&I Executive Council and the Executive Women’s Forum. She is a graduate of the WICT Betsy Magness Leadership Institute and the WISE Women’s Executive Leadership Institute.

IN HER OWN WORDS: “Launching international networks was like working
for a startup, you get to do a little of everything while still being part of the mother ship. That was an amazing advantage for me. Now I’m in a very different role. I’d never been in a control room producing SportsCenter, but content is storytelling and a lot of this role is about bringing teams together and collaborating to make sure we’re aligned in how we’re presenting things. So there are a lot
of similarities to what I was doing.”

CAROL STIFF
Adviser, Women’s Sports Network

KEY STATS: After 31 years at ESPN, Carol Stiff retired last year. She is now president of Stiff Sports Media Consulting and serves as an adviser for FAST Studios’ Women’s Sports Network. She pushed the fledgling streamer to make Game On, its proposed weekly studio show, into a daily news, talk and highlights show (a la SportsCenter).

VARSITY STATUS: At ESPN, Stiff was responsible for acquisition and programming across multiple sports, from NCAA women’s basketball to the Women’s College World Series to the WNBA to lacrosse and soccer. From 2013 to 2016 she served as VP of content integration for the espnW business. In that role, she led the company’s efforts to integrate espnW content across ESPN platforms. She is a Women’s Basketball Hall of Fame inductee, Naismith Lifetime Achievement Award recipient and an Edward R. Murrow award winner.

Stiff serves on the Women’s Sports Foundation Board of Governors and is president of the Women’s Basketball Hall of Fame Board of Trustees and the Collegiate Women’s Sports Awards Board of Directors.

IN HER OWN WORDS: “I still want to crack the code about why women’s sports isn’t front and center and why it’s not being supported by corporate America. These women athletes are great role models, they stay in college and graduate, they’re future CFOs, COOs and CEOs. They deserve the ability to be seen by their fans. 

“I was never in tune with having a women’s sports network, I always wanted for women to be on the main menu and be at ESPN. I was proud of filling the cupboard with women’s sports. When I left, ESPN showed 16,000 hours of women’s sports annually. 

“We have said to ESPN and others, we’re here to complement what you’re doing. We’re going to promote the ‘enemy’ because we want to raise all boats in women’s sports. What was lacking at ESPN was the great windows for women’s sports. When you put women’s sports in highly visible windows they do really well. The time is now.

“When this network said they’d have a studio news show I said, ‘Finally. Because I used to go to SportsCenter and say, ‘Here’s a triple overtime WNBA game, can you squeeze it in?’ And then it wouldn’t make air and I’d be the one getting the call from the commissioner. But when the network said it would be weekly I said, ‘No. It has to be daily or I’m out.’ And they said OK. 

“When I found out about the studio show I was with Billie Jean King and I whispered the news to her. She pumped her arms up and threw her head back. It was what she had done way back when she beat Bobby Riggs. That made me think, ‘We’re onto something here.’  ” ▪️

For this year’s Women in the Game profile subjects, looking back on the past year naturally meant thinking about the impact of the pandemic. But when they looked back even further, they reflected on the impact of playing sports at an early age on their careers. 

At CAA Sports, Alexa Cook said there was no slowing down during the pandemic. “Our group had the biggest year since its inception, orchestrating over $1 billion in sponsorship revenue,” she said. “We just kept going.”

Still, the pandemic naturally upended most plans. Julie Stewart-Binks had just finished constructing a set for her new FuboTV talk show, Drinks with Binks — she even helped with the painting — when the pandemic hit. “We ended up doing the show for the next 14 months from my apartment,” she said. Working at an upstart network enabled her to be more flexible with the show, tinkering with the format as everyone adapted, and the pandemic actually had a side benefit. “We were able to get more guests from all over the world because they didn’t need to be here to get to the studio,” Stewart-Binks said. “I’d just send an email, saying, ‘Here’s a link, click on it.’ ”

Micky Lawler, president of the World Tennis Association, said that even as the women’s tennis tour had to cancel events and adjust on the fly, officials worked on rebranding and new content for sponsors to replace canceled events. Beth Hutter, lead producer for Golf Channel, said that live events won’t be fully back to normal until the end of the year or even until 2022, changing her work dynamic tremendously. But Ndidi Massay, senior director of Workplace Culture and Diversity Initiatives for CBS Sports, said the new normal may benefit women in the long run.

“I have kids and always tried to do some work from home,” Massay said. “With some supervisors, there was a little bit of a fight. But the pandemic showed the world how effectively we can work from home and in the future there will be less of a fight for women.”

Time spent playing sports helped prepare these women to fight for what was rightfully theirs at work. “All the facets of playing sports transfer over,” Stewart-Binks, who went from being a competitive figure skater in Canada to playing hockey with both boys and girls teams (she still plays in a men’s league in New York), said. “You have to figure out how to handle new situations and you have to be prepared to work hard and give up a lot of your social life.” 

Hutter, who lettered in softball and soccer at the University of Virginia, also said sports taught her about hard work and preparation. “We practiced all facets of the game, day in, day out, to be ready for everything,” she said.  

Melanie Capacia Johnson, head of Whistle Studios at Team Whistle, played basketball and volleyball and was a sprinter, long jumper and triple jumper. “In high school, I had the most amazing hops and they called me Thumper,” she said. Two children later, she said, “I miss those hops,” but the years of sports gave her a “drive and tenacity competitive edge” and taught her about teamwork. “It’s how I run the studio,” Johnson said. “All our productions are very collaborative.”  

Cook earned a college scholarship and was an NCAA Division I four-year Scholar Athlete, serving as the president of student athletes and captain of the women’s swim team at Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles. Beyond the on-field lessons, she said, college sports opened her eyes to professional possibilities. “Prior to that, sports was just fun for me, but building a relationship with the athletic director, being the West Coast Conference rep and going to big NCAA meetings, I saw this whole business side of sports,” Cook recalled. “That actually piqued my interest in the whole industry. I was a finance major and really thought I was going into investment banking — it’s where I was interviewing — but sports was more interesting than portfolio management and this experience made me pursue my career in sports.”

Massay led Northwestern University’s softball team to the NCAA Women’s College World Series as a catcher and was inducted into Northwestern’s Athletics Hall of Fame. She later served as assistant softball coach while getting her law degree at the University of Notre Dame. “I grew up in the [San Francisco] Bay Area as a tomboy playing every sport under the sun with the boys and girls in my neighborhood,” she said. “The boys did not treat me differently when we played tackle football on the asphalt. That made me tougher and more aggressive.”

“Playing sports shaped everything in my life,” Massay said. The experience had helped her as a woman in the boardroom, because she can talk sports with men with enthusiasm, knowledge and credibility. Beyond the ease in those conversations, the lessons learned are innumerable.

“It’s not just teamwork, leadership skills and discipline, it’s learning how to win but also learning how to lose, and to learn from your losses,” she said. “That all transfers into the boardroom.” 

ALEXA COOK  

Property Sales Executive, CAA Sports

KEY STATS:  Within the past 24 months, Alexa Cook has generated more than $300 million in sponsorship revenue from three dozen partnerships, bringing together brands like Adobe, Amazon Web Services, Grubhub and Kia, and clients like Formula One and Red Bull Racing. She has brokered close to $100 million in esports deals, including Riot Games’ League of Legends Championship Series’ first-ever official beer partner (Bud Light); first-ever exclusive automotive partner (Honda); first-ever official energy drink partner (Red Bull); and first-ever official insurance partner (State Farm). 

Cook was central to the team that negotiated more than $1.3 billion in sponsorship deals for Chase Center in San Francisco, the Golden State Warriors’ new arena. Last year, the Oklahoma native built a partnership between CAA Sports and the Oklahoma City Thunder to launch the Thunder Fellows Program, to give opportunities in sports, technology, and entertainment for Black students around Tulsa, working with the 1921 Tulsa Race Massacre Centennial Commission.

VARSITY STATUS: Cook has worked at CAA Sports since 2010, starting as an assistant, going through the mailroom program and working her way up over the past decade. She opened the CAA Dallas office in 2017.

IN HER OWN WORDS: “CAA is the only place I’ve known, so I don’t know what it is like for other women in the industry, but for me it has been pretty darn incredible. Since day one, our leadership has been the most supportive possible, not just at this moment in time. 

“For each one of my clients there was a large learning curve — I had never heard of Formula One or esports before I came here — but at the end of the day, our business is so relationship-driven, and so we’re not working with the organizations, we’re working with the people that are there.

“Our group is founded on innovation, so we want to listen and learn from each pocket of the industry. When esports came about, we were lucky enough to be working with the leader in the space, Riot Games, and that allowed us to become pioneers in the space. It’s all about adapting and innovating and learning. Every deal feels like a miracle when it’s done, but it’s so much fun working on them.” 

BETH HUTTER 

Producer, Golf Channel

KEY STATS:  Beth Hutter is the lead producer for NBCUniversal-owned Golf Channel’s LPGA Tour events, a role she has held since 2005. Hutter has also produced several PGA Tour and PGA Tour Champions events, making her the first woman to produce a PGA Tour event for television.

In 2021, Hutter is responsible for live tournament coverage of the ANA Inspiration; the U.S. Women’s Open; the KPMG Women’s PGA Championship; the Evian Championship; women’s golf for the Tokyo Olympics; the Solheim Cup; and the CME Group Championship. She serves on the board of the Lady Legacy Scholarship Foundation in Birmingham, Alabama, raising money for college scholarships for girls in golf.

VARSITY STATUS: Hutter began her TV career at News 12 Long Island before joining ESPN, where she worked from 1996 to 1999 as a production assistant for all studio shows, including SportsCenter, Baseball Tonight, Monday Night Countdown, RPM Tonight and ESPNews. She joined Golf Channel in 1999, initially in a variety of production roles for both live events and studio shows. She was a studio producer for Golf Central and an associate director, feature producer and replay producer/director for live tournament shows.

IN HER OWN WORDS: “I started working on Wall Street because I had a B.S. in finance and marketing, but I hated it. I hated being indoors all the time, after playing sports 24/7. I had taken some video classes in college so I went to News 12 and said, ‘Hey, I don’t know that much about your industry so here’s what I’m willing to do: I’ll show up for six months every day, you don’t have to pay me a dime, let’s call it an internship, and after six months, hopefully you like my work.’ They thought it was a great idea. 

“We were the smallest TV station in the biggest sports market. It was nonstop and they didn’t have enough reporters, so they’d send me out. That was the year the Jets went 1-14 and finally I was the only one there on Mondays for the press conferences and it was such a joke that ESPN started running them and I got a few contacts at ESPN. Eventually, they hired me for their production assistant program. Later, Golf Channel had hired a ton of golf nuts who knew how to do research but didn’t know how to do television, and they needed TV people who knew some golf but could produce for their Golf Central show. 

“Being a producer for live sports is always fascinating because I can prepare as much as humanly possible, but you never know what’s going to happen. I try to make sure everyone is ready: the more you prepare, the easier it is to adapt on the fly. So I inundate myself and try to prepare for every scenario. Even when it’s exciting, I try to be as even-keeled as possible

MELANIE CAPACIA JOHNSON

Head of Whistle Studios, Team Whistle

KEY STATS: Melanie Capacia Johnson heads the scripted, unscripted, animation and interactive studio business for Team Whistle, a next-generation publisher, agency and studio, specializing in telling 360-degree inspiring stories in sports and entertainment. She oversees the production from Whistle, Tiny Horse, Vertical Network and New Form. With Team Whistle being acquired by multinational broadcaster Eleven Sports (owned by Aser Ventures), Johnson will be in charge of the company’s U.S. content. Under Johnson the studio has produced projects with Dwayne Wade (Legacy), Carmelo Anthony (Fight Ball) and Steph Curry (NAACP Image Awards-nominated Benedict Men) that span across premium streaming services, Snapchat, YouTube, Instagram, Facebook and Whistle’s owned channels. Whistle Studios and Insight TV are partnering on Making (Her)Story, a docuseries following three rising female athletes competing in the male-dominated sports of horse, NASCAR and Formula 4 racing.

VARSITY STATUS: Johnson was the cofounder of Tiny Horse in 2011 and sold her  company to Team Whistle last year. She started out as an independent film producer before working on live and unscripted programming at Viacom, working on programs like the MTV Movie Awards, MTV Video Music Awards, Hip Hop Honors, Rock Honors, VH1 Divas and Nickelodeon Kids’ Choice Awards. 

IN HER OWN WORDS: “We had been working with Whistle since 2016, creating authentic content for people watching on digital. We were being courted by several companies for acquisition and where Whistle was headed was the best fit: we were very like minded. But when I came in the four companies under Team Whistle were working in silos and not talking to each other so I’ve been putting it all together collectively, shaping new goals and aspirations. 

“I came up in traditional linear production and saw a lot of line producers and producers yell and scream and throw things. That’s not how you build a team that will be excited to come to work every day. I can provide stern feedback when needed but I’m not a yeller, I find a solution. As a woman in charge, I am communicative and let people know they will be heard. I do have a nurturing side, creating a safe space. Maybe that’s just me being a mother.”

MICKY LAWLER

President, World Tennis Association

KEY STATS: As president of the World Tennis Association since 2015, Micky Lawler has overseen commercial growth and marketing of women’s tennis, including several rebranding campaigns. She has helped expand the geographic footprint of women’s tennis, most notably with a historic investment partnership for the WTA Finals in China, while crafting specialized rights deals (like the one for StatsPerform data rights recently in 2020) and commercial partnerships like Porsche Race to Shenzen, all while leading to closer collaboration with the men’s tour. 

VARSITY STATUS: Lawler was working as a language teacher in Paris in 1985
when she saw an ad for a job as a press officer with the Men’s International Professional Tennis Council. She got that job and after two years there, spent nearly 27 years at Octagon, overseeing all aspects of the sports agency’s Tennis Division, including player representation, event management and international business initiatives across Octagon’s sport and entertainment platforms. Prior to assuming the WTA presidency, Lawler put in 11 years as a WTA board member.

IN HER OWN WORDS: “It’s certainly possible, considering the deep-rooted passion my family and I have always had for sports and strong female role models like my grandmother, women’s tennis might have found me. Either way, I’m incredibly fortunate and grateful to the universe for its divine intervention with that ad early on. 

“At Octagon, I had the opportunity to work closely with specific athletes
from beginning to end, which offered a deeper understanding of what individual players need at every turn from a holistic approach: workload management, commercial opportunities, marketing, public relations, etc. 

“I also learned the importance of adapting and aligning to a players’ journey, whether it be humble beginnings in a single market, or global star power that transcends one’s sport. These were invaluable learnings for my role as board member at the WTA and soon thereafter as president.”

NDIDI MASSAY 

Senior Director of Workplace Culture and Diversity Initiatives, CBS Sports

KEY STATS:  The role of senior director of Workplace Culture and Diversity Initiatives for CBS Sports was created with the hiring of Massay, who began in February and will drive the strategic planning, development, execution and measurement of CBS Sports initiatives toward a more diverse and inclusive workplace. She will create tailored strategies, programs and experiences, reporting to CBS Sports chairman Sean McManus and president David Berson.

VARSITY STATUS: Massay has deep experience in this field, running her own consulting business to provide diversity, equity and inclusion counsel, services and training to corporate entities, national governing bodies and collegiate athletic departments. She had served as the commissioner of the New York State Athletic Commission since 2016. Prior to that, she helped launch the Ross Initiative in Sports for Equality (RISE), a nonprofit that works to improve race relations throughout sports by promoting understanding, respect and equality, and was a diversity-
and-inclusion consultant for the NFL. Earlier in her career, Massay was director of business affairs for ABC News and director of business operations and development for ESPN, after working as an attorney on issues related to both sports and entertainment law and diversity and inclusion matters. 

IN HER OWN WORDS: “I started to focus more on diversity, equity and inclusion (D, E and I) about 10 years ago, because career opportunities in the area were available and the older I got, the more I thought about making a difference — making lasting change rather than just doing a job. Over the last year as civil unrest has really exploded, the D, E and I space has moved to a whole different level. I was serving as a commissioner for NYSAC but still consulting in D, E and I and wanted to focus on it full time. Katrina Adams [Women in the Game, 2017] is a good friend and sent the CBS Sports role to me. The job description read like it was written for me. I wanted to build something here like I did at RISE and take CBS Sports to the next level.

“I’ve been in those interviews where I felt it was a check-the-box role. I did not take those jobs: I don’t want to be a check-the-box person. I want to be in a role where I have resources, commitment and support from senior management. Sean and David are 100% committed to D, E and I. It’s real and it has teeth. We want to create a more diverse workforce at all levels and to create a more inclusive culture." 

JULIE STEWART-BINKS

Host, ‘Drinks with Binks,’ Fubo Sports Network

KEY STATS: Julie Stewart-Binks is the host of Drinks with Binks, an interview show that premiered with the launch of Fubo Sports Network in 2019. She also anchors Call It a Night, a late-night show that earned a Telly Award, and Ball Is Back, a series that highlights the return of major tournaments and sporting events. 

VARSITY STATUS: Early in her career, Stewart-Binks was a reporter on Fox Soccer’s Fox Soccer Report in Winnipeg; a program assistant at CBC’s Hockey Night in Canada and a sports anchor and reporter at CTV in Regina, Saskatchewan. She later was one of the original anchors and reporters for FS1 and hosted the 2014 Sochi Olympics and reported on the 2015 Women’s World Cup. In 2015, she also became Fox’s regular sideline reporter for Major League Soccer matches, before moving to ESPN, where she was a sideline reporter for MLS as well as the U.S. men’s and women’s national soccer teams and college football. (She is the first female reporter to call two straight MLS Cups with two different networks. Fox and ESPN.) Stewart-Binks moved to Barstool Sports as the host of Barstool Breakfast on Sirius XM in 2017 before leaving to train in improv comedy and try her hand at stand-up as well. 

IN HER OWN WORDS: “Growing up, I wanted to win at the Olympics in figure skating and track and field. When I realized that wasn’t going to happen, I got a double degree in physical and health education and drama. Everyone laughed at me, but it’s now the bread and butter of what I do. I wanted to go into sports psychology, but my mom, a radio reporter, said you should volunteer at the local radio station at the university. They said, ‘We have too many volunteers, try the TV station.’ And the TV station said, ‘We need someone to do an interview tomorrow.’ The adrenaline rush of being on camera, gearing up for the live moment, reminded me so much of my sports days. I realized I wanted to do this and became a campus sports reporter. 

“When I left my job to learn improv, it was because I wanted to become better at listening and responding: When you’re doing interviews, it’s the key to everything. Before this, I had the opportunity to go to a traditional network and do more traditional work. But I met with Pamela Duckworth [Women in the Game, 2020] and she was so warm, smart and powerful and she’s a woman, and I’ve always, except once, had male bosses. I wanted to be around this trailblazer. I do feel a bit of onus: I want to help give back too. I like to feature women and as many Black journalists on my show as I can. I want to use my show for good, or else what’s the point?”

Participants of the TV + Sports Summit June 10 will hear insights from industry thought leaders across TV, video and sports.

The virtual event will feature a keynote from Rita Ferro, president of advertising sales for Disney Media & Entertainment. Ferro will address the value of live sports on TV in a chat with Broadcasting + Cable business editor Jon Lafayette from ESPN studios in New York City.

Also on tap are panels that will explore all aspects of sports on TV, including production, distribution, monetization, audience measurement, and user experience. Attendees will see participants from industry leaders, such as Fox Sports, Turner Sports, Bally Sports, fuboTV, FloSports, comScore, and TVision, among others. 

On June 9, TV + Sports Summit will incorporate a live event version of the B+C and Multichannel News annual editorial feature Women in the Game. The 2021 roster of sports TV world executives and talent comes from the ranks of CAA Sports, CBS Sports, World Tennis Association, Golf Channel, Whistle Studios and Fubo Sports Network. Read all about them in the upcoming B+C/Multichannel News June issue.

The summit, presented by Broadcasting+Cable, Multichannel News, TV Tech and NextTV, is part of Future’s Summer TV 2021, which includes the TV Data & Measurement Summit.

In the midst of the strangest, most unnerving and upsetting year in decades, sports necessarily took a back seat to the pandemic. When the games returned, even without fans in the arena, sports on television gave U.S. audiences the jolt of semi-normalcy they craved. In the midst of all this, women continued to make gains behind the scenes and in front of the camera, frequently shouldering the responsibility for making sure the transition from shutdown to partial reopening went as smoothly as possible. 

This year’s Women in the Game feature — profiling women who are stars in their fields in TV sports — touched on the challenges the executives and on-air personnel faced, and overcame, during the pandemic. Profilees also talked about how the industry has changed, and continues changing, for women executives. 

“Things are so different now from when I started,” fubo Sports Network head Pamela Duckworth said. “There’s especially been a huge shift since #MeToo, bringing more awareness to the issues of equity.”

Caroline Rebello, managing director at Evolution Media Capital, agreed. Now more than ever, she said, top executives “recognize that you want as many different voices in your company to make the best product and produce the best vision.”

These women say more change is needed and that they willingly take on some of that responsibility. “There’s still a long way to go, we need more women in leadership positions in all areas of sports and people of color too,” MLB Network senior VP, operations and engineering Susan Stone said. 

“If you see people [like you] in leadership, you believe it is a possibility for you,” she added, explaining that this will, in turn, attract more women and people of color to the field. 

Many of these women make mentoring, either formally or informally, a top priority, reaching back down the ladder to help the next generation. “I’m stubborn and I almost didn’t get into this field and I never want that to happen to anyone else,” said Kaitlin Urka, producer, NBC Sports & Olympics. “There are still roadblocks, but we’re chipping away at the glass ceiling.”

Judy Boyd, senior VP, production and coordinating producer, Fox Sports, pointed out that women are not looking for special treatment. “We just need to make sure everybody gets an equal opportunity to do the job,” she said. “We don’t need to make it easier for women, we just need to put everyone on the same playing field.”

Bess Barnes 
VP, Programming, CBS Sports

Key Stats:  Bess Barnes, captain of Michigan’s golf team while in college, oversees golf programming for CBS Sports, including scheduling, acquisitions and partner relations. She also leads college basketball scheduling across CBS Sports and CBS Sports Network, including the NCAA Division I Men’s Basketball Tournament and regular-season contests.

Varsity Status:  Barnes previously oversaw college football scheduling and has been involved in media-rights deals such as the renewals with the Big Ten for college basketball and the PGA Tour, as well as the extension of CBS’s joint March Madness deal with Turner Sports. She also created the CBS Sports Classic (an annual CBS college basketball doubleheader featuring Kentucky, North Carolina, UCLA and Ohio State) and brought the first-ever college bowl game to CBS Sports Network, the Cure Bowl, in 2015. 

Barnes previously spent 10 years at ESPN. She is co-chair of CBS Sports’s corporate cross-departmental We Need to Talk Steering Committee and serves on the executive committee of the CBS Sports Women’s Group.

In Her Own Words: “In college, I took an aptitude test that said I should be a reporter, but I don’t like speaking in front of people, so I went into TV and worked on sports shows, producing men’s hockey, women’s basketball and studio programs. I love working in the programming group because we’re involved in everything from scheduling to production, and that makes it fun. 

“Throughout the industry, there is now more of an understanding that a diverse perspective, which includes gender, provides greater value in the workplace. But even at CBS Sports, which is a very good place for women, we are not equal in numbers. I do think we have a responsibility to the next generation and that’s why I got involved with We Need to Talk and the executive committee of the CBS Sports Women’s Group. There was a young woman who mentioned that she was looking for mentorship and wanted to get to know the women executives outside of the office. It was a great idea because we’re all busy in the office, and this opened things up for a more casual and natural relationship and has turned into a great success.” 

Judy Boyd 
Senior VP, Production and Coordinating Producer, Fox Sports

Key Stats: Judy Boyd is a multisport star at Fox Sports, with Major League Baseball, college football and soccer, including the FIFA World Cup, under her purview. She handles oversight of all live event production for those three categories and is involved in other facets of production within Fox Sports. Boyd also works extensively with FS1, the company’s 24/7 national cable sports network.

Varsity Status: Boyd joined Fox Sports in 2000 as a broadcast associate, her first professional job. She primarily worked on MLB coverage. Since then, she has worked in various production roles on NFL, MLB, college football and NASCAR telecasts. Named coordinating producer of MLB in 2010, Boyd was elevated to VP in 2012; she was also coordinating producer for Fox Sports Digital Entertainment.

In Her Own Words: “In college [at Cal State Northridge], I studied broadcast journalism and history and was thinking about law school. I really liked live
television but not the news, which was all murders and car chases. I liked sports. Fox Sports is the only place I’ve ever worked. I’ve always been lucky, even when I was a production assistant here, there were always other women working in the group. The production side has been more male-dominated over the years. There was a time when women thought they couldn’t get into that world but that’s not the case anymore.

“What I love is the challenge of a new project of finding new ways to do things, whether it’s through the evolution of technology or the growth of our people. I do miss live television, being hands-on, sitting in the truck. So I still go and do it for the NFL show. I enjoy it, but also that way I know what my people are going through and how to help them get the resources they need.

“With the pandemic, we had to figure out how to do broadcasts with Joe Buck in St. Louis and John Smoltz in Atlanta. They weren’t together at a ballpark until [Globe Life Field] in Texas in the postseason. When we were in the bubble there, we learned some things we will use in the future. Some, like cameras on top of the dugout because there were no fans, we won’t be able to [do], but cable-cams along the first- and third-base lines and different high-speed cameras, we will continue to use. We usually have 350 to 400 people on site, and we had 200 this year, with people like editors working remotely. I think that’s the future. There’s a learning curve, but we can embrace it.”

Key Stats:  Andi Chu oversees all of Tennis Channel’s nonlinear and operations activity, building a new multiplatform content division for the Sinclair Broadcast Group-owned channel. She and her team relaunched TennisChannel.com and its app as a streaming destination. She led the reboot of Tennis Channel Plus with longform content including curated playlists and new content. After Sinclair bought Tennis Media (which produced Tennis magazine and Tennis.com), she integrated it into the Tennis Channel operational and content structure. She also oversees e-letter Baseline and the Tennis Channel Podcast Network. Chu spearheaded Tennis’s first digital series, My Tennis Life, with active professional players.

Varsity Status:  Before joining Tennis Channel in 2016 as executive director, digital operations and content, Chu spent six years at the Women’s Tennis Association, handling content and social media across digital platforms for the tour and its players and sponsors. That came after a career in Los Angeles working in feature film and television, including roles as director of development at Paramount Pictures’ Alphaville Productions and director of distribution for ManiaTV.

In Her Own Words: “I wanted to be in film development and production so I went to Los Angeles. Eventually, I moved to work for digital startups, in part because I’m an early adopter and I was looking for knowledge outside traditional formats and for creative ways to do storytelling. 

“When I got to the WTA, I had no sports experience but I wanted to see what it was like and found the fast pace — everything is so accelerated there, compared to film and television — so rewarding. I also got to see the world and understand how production is done globally. 

“I’m especially proud of how we handled the pandemic this year. We were able to get up and running and then to fill our social channels with new content even when there were no matches on, leading to an increase in traffic.

“I’m hands-on in all the areas that I oversee, but building a team has been one of the real highlights for me. When I joined, I had one hire but now I have a full-time team of 17 and another 17 reporters/talent under contract to provide print, online or on-air content. I’m very big on diversity: When I came to Hollywood as an Asian-Canadian female, I saw how difficult it can be. Mentoring is also important for me to go back and give others the same opportunity.” 

Marie DeParis  
Senior VP of Marketing and Affiliate Relations, SNY 

Key Stats:  Marie DeParis is responsible for brand marketing for SportsNet New York — the official television home of the New York Mets, New York Jets and UConn Huskies — including on-air promotion, advertising, events and sales promotion and affiliate relations. DeParis has won eight New York Emmy Awards and six Promax North America/BDA Promotion & Marketing Awards for television commercial campaigns, promotional spots and digital projects.

Varsity Status: Prior to joining SNY in 2007, DeParis was senior VP of strategic marketing and sales for the New York Daily News, where she led all consumer and trade marketing; she also served as associate publisher of the Daily News website. She previously held management positions at Fox Television and Radio City Music Hall Productions in New York. She also serves on the Bethany College Board of Trustees (her alma mater) and the Professional Advisory Board of the Business of Sports School, a New York City public high school.

In Her Own Words: “I always gravitated to sports. In college, I was the first female analyst on radio for baseball there. In my job at a public-relations firm, my boss asked me to research Johnny Bench for a Crest promotion but he was my favorite player and I said, ‘I know everything there is to know about him.’ I got to do a lot of sports work there, though it wasn’t all baseball: I did have to do a tractor pull promotion for a motor oil company, too. 

“At Radio City, I learned about working in live entertainment, so I feel that in my career one thing always leads to the next. At the Daily News there was always sports in promotions and partnerships. I worked with all the leagues, so when I came to SNY it didn’t feel like there was a transition, especially because I worked on SNY’s first live show, Daily News Live, from the Daily News side. 

“At SNY, the senior staff is 10 or 11 people and I was the only woman for years, but now there are four women, which is really refreshing. We provide such a difference in perspective and since all our jobs cross over to everything from programming to human resources, it’s important to have that.  Everybody is starting to move more toward that direction. Cable is much more female-friendly than the teams and leagues — they are still dominated by men — but I’ve definitely seen a change.” 

Pamela Duckworth 
Head, fubo Sports Network

Key Stats:  As head of fuboTV’s live, free-to-consumer TV network, launched a year ago, Pamela Duckworth is responsible for all creative direction, including original programming. In addition to partner programming from Stadium and Players Tribune, original programming includes No Chill with Gilbert Arenas; Call It a Night and Drinks With Binks, both hosted by Julie Stewart-Binks, and The Cooligans. She also still runs Duckworth Entertainment, a full-service creative marketing production company based in New York and Los Angeles. 

Varsity Status:  After five years as a producer at QVC and later spending two years at Al Roker Productions, Duckworth was head of advertising production and events at DirecTV for 10 years, through 2016. She then founded Duckworth Entertainment. Over the course of her career, she has been honored with twelve Cannes Lions, three Clios and two Effies, among other awards. 

In Her Own Words:  “I played volleyball and soccer growing up and through my dad, who had four girls, came to live for college football. We were in Ohio and my grandma was friendly with [legendary coach] Woody Hayes. There’s something about sports, the passion of it, the adrenaline, that fits my personality. 

“When AT&T bought DirecTV we all scattered, but at one point Joel Armijo, who had been there with me but who had become CFO of fubo, brought me in to do some consulting. Then last year, CEO David Gandler said, ‘We should start our own network. Can you do it in two months?’ I’m never one to back down from a challenge, I just said, ‘Give me three months.’

“It was a whirlwind. I brought on producers and talent, and by September 2019 we had three original shows as well as partner programming. We provided a fresh point of view, a more comedic one in a time where sports can get so serious. My goal is to get into the athletes’ minds and to bring on more personalities.

“It’s a crowded field with so much great content and the big dogs launching independent streaming, too. Our goal is to stay in the game and stay relevant. When the pandemic hit we never went dark, we pivoted to doing the shows from home. I’m really proud of our whole team. People know our name now and are coming to us with pitches every day, which is cool. 

“I was fortunate to have great mentors, who were men, bringing me up through the ranks. I worked in car racing in the late ’80s and I was the only woman there. Today, I make sure my team is diverse. I like internal promotion. I can bring a woman in as a production assistant and then move her up.” 

Caroline Rebello
Managing Director, Evolution
Media Capital

Key Stats:  Caroline Rebello’s deals — $4 billion in a single year —  are reshaping the U.S. sports media landscape. Recently, she has helped close deals such as the launch of Marquee Sports Network by the Chicago Cubs and Sinclair Broadcast Group; the St. Louis Blues’ local media deal with Fox Sports Midwest; and the Detroit Pistons’ local media deal with Fox Sports Detroit. She also advised two individuals on their acquisition of an NBA and an NHL franchise and secured favorable outcomes for two pro sports teams in confidential media valuation disputes.

Varsity Status:  Past deals at Evolution Media Capital, which is CAA’s merchant bank, have included the Vegas Golden Knights’ local broadcast deal with AT&T SportsNet; the Charlotte Hornets’ local broadcast deal with Fox Sports South in 2012; and the Brooklyn Nets’ local broadcast deal with YES Network. Since joining EMC in 2010, she has helped grow the group from a client roster of one team to more than five dozen. Prior to Evolution Media, Rebello served as an investor at TowerBrook and a media and sports strategic development executive at SCP Worldwide.

In Her Own Words: “I was a pole vaulter in high school and college and I wanted to work in sports, but I didn’t know if it was possible. At Wharton, I really liked economics and business, which led to investment banking at a private-equity firm. We made an investment in a hockey team and the opportunity to work in sports came up so I decided to try it out. Then I was able to jump over into the sports business and learn the media business, so at Evolution I was happy to combine it all. 

“I was conscious that this was a rare opportunity. It was not about being a woman, but about coming in as an outsider. I came from banking, which is predominantly male, so like it or not you get used to it. Now at Evolution and CAA overall, there are more and more women every year. 

“I’ve been involved in WISE Within (Women in Sports and Events), but I also always have an open-door policy for any woman who emails, calls or texts me. I make a point to try and get them where they’re going. I’m also involved in Forward, the CAA women’s group, and I sit on the multicultural committee as well. I mentor women on the track team at my alma mater, too, for those who might want to enter finance or media or sports. It’s really important to give back.” 

Key Stats:  Susan Stone oversees all production and studio operations, such as the Emmy Award-winning MLB Tonight and NHL Tonight, MLB Network Showcase game telecasts, and on-site studio programs from All-Star Week, the Stanley Cup Finals and the World Series. She oversees the operations and engineering for NHL Network as part of the NHL-MLB digital media rights partnership announced in 2015.

Varsity Status: Before joining MLB Network in 2008 to help oversee its launch the following year, Stone held crucial jobs throughout the sports media industry. Previously, Stone had taken time off in 2001 after the birth of her son (and subsequently her daughter) but then did consulting and part-time work for NFL Network before returning full-time as remote operations executive for more than two years. Prior to having children, she had worked as director of production services at CBS Sports, and director of production management and venue operations, NBC Olympics.

In Her Own Words: “I was always a sports fan — props to my dad, who had two daughters and always took us to Mets, Giants, Rangers and Knicks games — but a sports career was never on my agenda. After college, I did some production work in theater, but I wanted more stability. I thought that I loved production and operations, so maybe it would be fun to do it for sports on television. A friend told me about a temporary secretary job in production at NBC Sports. It led to a full-time job and I found my niche. But it never occurred to me then that a woman could have the job I do.

“We shut down on March 16, but by March 25 we were on the air for MLB Opening Day at Home, which is one of the things I’m proudest of in my career. It took effort and creativity. I always engage in any great idea. I just say, bring them all to the table, like when our technical director volunteers at a local high school where he was working on a cloud-based production system and said we might be able to do something with it. There are some things that may hold future uses, too. Our engineers found tools to allow our editors to work remotely, which is good because we’re usually bursting at the seams here and because we’re not in the city, so snow can create major stress in the winter and this can help people work remotely in the off-season.” 

Maria Taylor 
College Sports Host, Analyst and Reporter/NBA Countdown Host, ESPN

Key Stats:  Maria Taylor has been a reporter for College GameDay and ABC Saturday Night Football since 2017 and she is also a host for NBA Countdown. In addition, Taylor serves as an analyst on other SEC and ESPN telecasts, including volleyball and women’s basketball and contributes to ESPN’s NBA Draft coverage.

Varsity Status:  At the University of Georgia, where Taylor majored in broadcast news, she played varsity volleyball and basketball and was named to the all-SEC volleyball team three times. She later earned an MBA at Georgia. After getting her master’s degree, she became a college football analyst and sideline reporter for ESPN and later added to her résumé with roles as an analyst and host for the network’s coverage of the NCAA Women’s Basketball Tournament and Women’s Volleyball National Championship and as a sideline reporter for men’s college basketball.

In Her Own Words: “I was going to be a doctor and major in biology but it wasn’t going great, so then I switched to business until I took a journalism class with a friend. I was freelancing after college and went back to get the MBA because I wasn’t sure if TV would work out so I thought I could work in athletic administration. I worked initially at Comcast Sports South, doing volleyball, which was in my comfort zone, but then also high-school football and SEC football, too. 

“The roles have certainly changed for women in recent years. It used to be the only roles were the sideline reporters, which were more marginalized. But now women have the expectation of hosting and Doris Burke is in the booth for the NBA and Jessica Mendoza for baseball. The doors keep getting broken down. There’s still a lot of ground to cover, but there’s slow but sure progress as women have really invaded this male-dominated space. 

“I would not want to do play-by-play, but I would love to be an analyst. The NCAA women’s tournament is the most fun I’ve ever had at work. This year, being in the bubble for my first NBA season was a big challenge but it was exciting, hosting all the coverage of the games and all the other issues about the coronavirus and social justice issues.

“I co-founded in 2014 the Winning Edge Leadership Academy, which runs programs for women and minorities in sports and entertainment and business, so I might be helping someone looking to get into broadcasting but also someone who wants to become an athletic director.”

Kaitlin Urka
Producer, NBC Sports & Olympics

Key Stats:  At NBC since 2011, Kaitlin Urka’s work has earned her four Sports Emmys as she has tackled the world’s biggest events: the Olympics, the Super Bowl, the Stanley Cup Finals and the Tour de France. On March 8, she created the very first all-women’s NHL broadcast (on-air and behind the scenes) to celebrate International Women’s Day. 

Varsity Status:  Urka studied journalism at the University of Michigan, where she was named one of the 100 most promising student journalists in the nation and received an award for excellence in communications studies. She also served as general manager of WOLV-TV, the student-run station on campus. As part of Gannett’s Talent Development program, she got her start in television as a morning show associate producer and on-air talent.

In Her Own Words: “I thought communications studies was a springboard for law school. I didn’t see women working in television, so I thought I could go into sports law. When I went to the school’s TV station there was not a single woman on any sports program, so I worked on all of them, then I recruited other women. I had a passion for sports and TV and I was good at it. Still, even when I was at Gannett I thought about law school because I had people there tell me they’d never hire a woman to work in sports and that I didn’t belong there.  

“I was a Punt, Pass and Kick champion when I was 9. But people don’t see that and make assumptions, while no one asks men to see their credentials. I was turned away by an old man at the locker room door during an NCAA tournament when I was the Michigan beat reporter.  I like to think most of those guys are gone now, but there are still biases that exist and I still have to work twice as hard to prove my worth.

“The all-woman broadcast came about when analyst A.J. Mleczko took her teenage daughter inside a production truck and her daughter said, ‘Mom, where are all the women?’ We are all so spread out — there are really talented women working here in all areas but we very rarely all get to be together. And that can get lonely. 

“The idea is that ‘if you see it, you can be it,’ but I didn’t want to just show girls, I wanted to show little boys so the idea of women working in these jobs becomes the norm and we don’t have to make a big deal of it. I was so nervous before the game, since social media can be such a negative space, but the reaction was overwhelmingly positive. We’re still chipping away at stereotypes and assumptions just to give women equal footing.

Sara Zuckert  
Senior Director and Head of Next-Gen Telecast, NBA 

Key Stats:  Sara Zuckert played a particularly crucial role in overseeing the NBA’s bubble, the isolation zone set up at Walt Disney World to protect players from COVID-19. Zuckert oversaw the virtual fan initiative for the NBA Season Restart in Orlando, Florida, which included video boards surrounding the court filled with digital "fans" who could interact with each other in real time. Overall, Zuckert is focused on evolving game telecasts across all channels, featuring customizable experiences, alternate camera angles, companion content and interactive engagement.  

Varsity Status: Zuckert landed an NBA internship in 2013, while getting an MBA from Yale, then joined the league full-time in 2014. She started in the Domestic Programming & Content Strategy group, focused on content strategy, game flow and telecast innovation. Prior to the NBA, Zuckert worked in media planning and programming for TV Land. She is also a member of the board of WBRU, a nonprofit digital media workshop for college students affiliated with Brown University, her alma mater.

in her own words:  “Working for the NBA was a dream of mine. I’m not just a fan of the teams but of the league’s presence in the media space. My internships, at Madison Square Garden and then at the NBA, were fantastic learning experiences, as was my experience on the business side of the radio station at college. The NBA has provided great opportunities for me. My job is in programming but it crosses over into media, business and content strategy, so there are great chances to learn about all aspects of the business. 

“At Next Gen, we had already been working on the game flow in telecasts, working with players and officials to change things like the number of timeouts to make it better for the fans at home. With the absence of fans, we tried things we had used in summer league and other games, like different camera angles and the ‘rail cam.’ [This lets the streaming audience see the action through a lens on a mobile table that moves up and down the court with the action.] We also experimented with everything from the audio soundscape coming from the courts to ways to give virtual fans a chance to participate.

“We know that 99% of NBA fans are not at games in person, so even after the pandemic is over we will continue to find ways to create the best atmosphere for fans at home, maybe using some of these ideas.”

On the U.S. and international sports stages, powerful women’s teams -- from the FIFA World Cup-winning U.S. women’s national soccer team to the the University of Connecticut Huskies, winners of four consecutive NCAA Division I National Championship titles -- are changing the sports landscape.

Women also are having a powerful impact among the ranks of sports media companies. That’s why since 2011 Multichannel News and Broadcasting & Cable have selected a team of all-stars we call Women in the Game. Meet the Class of 2015 here.

Nominations for the 2016 class are now open to our readers through Monday, May 23. Women with leadership roles in sports-related media who have not been members of a prior Women in the Game class (2011-2015) are eligible. To nominate someone you know, click here to complete the nomination form, which covers some information about her, about you and, importantly, why you think she should be a Woman in the Game.

The 2016 Women in the Game class will be honored in the June 20 issues of Multichannel News and Broadcasting & Cable.

Click here for more Women in the Game stories.