For tonight’s Mavericks-Pelicans NBA game on ESPN, it will be an all-women-led broadcast with Beth Mowins and Doris Burke on the call and Cassidy Hubbarth as the sideline reporter on National Women’s Day. Burke has had the opportunity to be a game analyst for many years and she is thankful for the repetitions she got when she started in the business.
Burke was a guest on The Marchand and Ourand Sports Media Podcast as “the big get” this week and she said that her career was a “happy accident” and that a decision one college made helped start to get her where she is today after she was no longer an assistant coach at Providence.
“My career is a happy accident. Basketball has always been the most important driving force in my life since I was 7 years old. Picked up a ball, it’s responsible for an education my parents would never have been able to afford. I’m the last of 8. The year I left coaching at Providence, they decided to put Providence women’s college basketball on radio. That was literally my first foray into this business.
“Thankfully, no one was listening when I started. You got lots of repetitions before anyone could hear your mistakes. Sometimes, life is about timing and opportunity. Women’s basketball coverage was starting to explode and it’s just been a gradual progression from 1990 moving all the way to where we are now.”
Burke mentioned that one of the pivotal moments in her career arc was when the WNBA was formed because it allowed her to be a part of a women’s professional broadcast in one summer and do a women’s college basketball game in the winter.
“One of the pivotal moments for me was the formation of the WNBA. I’m always indebted to women’s basketball. I’ve played it, I’ve coached it. In 1997, that was the first time a woman could make a living between the 30 games I’d do in the summer and the 30 games I would do in the winter.”
Towards the end of the interview, Marchand asked Burke if she ever thought of going back into coaching, and while Burke said one organization asked her if she considered doing it again, she loves what she does now.
“I’ve had some feelers out there. People have asked. I’ve actually had one organization ask ‘Would you ever consider the other side of things?’ I just said no, I’m very fortunate to be where I am. I love what I do, I love the preparation of it, and the live action of it.
“There was a time when I left coaching to be honest with you that I missed. There is something very special about working collectively towards a goal and sort of experiencing the highs and lows of winning and losing. There is nothing probably as special as that. I’ve always believed that broadcasting imported me a greater balance between parenting than coaching did.”
