Ahead of the NBC Sports prime-time broadcast of Sunday Night Football during the NFL season, Maria Taylor is situated within the network studios for the preceding slate of games. As the host of Football Night in America, the most-watched weekly studio show in sports since its debut in 2006, she has a distinct responsibility to keep viewers invested and aware of occurrences around the league leading into the signature matchup. The program has a large cast that is dispersed at the studio and live from the site of the game but nonetheless remains collectively rooted on the gridiron.
NBC’s Football Night in America analyzes completed games while previewing the prime-time showdown about to ensue. Throughout the day, Taylor makes observations and listens to what her colleagues have to say in order to align them for success on the studio show.
“It’s the production meeting, it’s everyone being in the same room,” Taylor said. “We’re eating meals together, we’re talking together [and] we’re feeling each other out. That is a huge part of [it] so that when we get into the studio and the game’s ending suddenly, we can remember what a guy was hyped about or excited about or was talking about during the game.”
Taylor has an array of colleagues with varying experience, all of whom bring different viewpoints and contribute to insightful, salient conversations. Devin McCourty, Chris Simms and Jason Garrett all bring tangible NFL experience and are able to simplify things for the audience. Taylor describes herself as being akin to a point guard in her role, a characterization encompassing her placing metaphorical building blocks to enable engaging discussion.
“The setups are definitely when you know that a person is head-over-heels in love with one aspect of the game, I don’t shy away from making sure that I’m giving them a shot at talking about that thing that they love,” Taylor said. “That’s very important, and then even sometimes they feed off of each other, great.”
Within their conversations on Football Night in America, Taylor tries to ensure that she can candidly express her personality and intersperses her opinions as well. Demonstrating such is something she does not force, instead trying to convey a natural, welcoming milieu to the viewers as if they were conversing in their living room.
“I always have viewed television as just like it might be a slightly more amped up version of me, but it is me,” Taylor said. “I do believe that the audience can tell when you’re faking, and that’s the last thing you want to do.”
Taylor is entering her third season as the host of Football Night in America after initially joining NBC Sports in 2021. The show is an entity she feels is distinctive and precedes a sports property that has rendered itself appointment viewing. In fact, Sunday Night Football averaged 21.4 million viewers last season, indicative of an 8% year-over-year increase, and also finished as the No. 1 show in prime-time television in all key metrics for a 13th consecutive year. Taylor recognizes the privilege and responsibility preceding the broadcast and feels that the program consistently delivers stellar information, analysis and storytelling.
“We’re the only show that really does get to comment on every single game that happens on Sunday and preview the one game that nobody has seen yet,” Taylor said. “I think that’s a unique space to operate in, but it’s the first time that you’re getting analysts to dive into a game, and it is a split-second reaction, so it’s like instant reaction that you’re seeing and all the highlights that are on Twitter and everything like that, so I think that that’s unique.”
NBCUniversal acquired broadcasting rights to the Big Ten Conference under a seven-year deal with the entity and started presenting prime time coverage on Saturday nights last season. Preceding the call of the game featuring the lead Big Ten Saturday Night broadcast team, Taylor is in the NBC Sports studios hosting Big Ten College Countdown.
“It’s like extracurricular fun for me – I love talking about college as well, and I’ve watched every game, I would say, even before we got the Big Ten back, so I was ready when it was time,” Taylor explained, “and obviously the only thing that’s really changed is now the playoff format and the idea of transfers, so you got to spend a little bit more time getting to know rosters as the season starts because a lot of things have changed.”
Taylor attended the University of Georgia under an athletic scholarship for her abilities in volleyball and basketball, balancing both while studying broadcast news. Damon Evans, former Georgia athletic director, served as a mentor and helped her land a job as a production assistant for International Sports Properties. Shortly after her time on the local level, which coincided with earning a master’s degree in business, Taylor was hired by ESPN as a college analyst and reporter in 2014. Upon joining the company full time, she continued sideline reporting for games on SEC Network and was named to the role for Saturday Night Football on ABC three years later.
“You’re kind of like the first line of defense,” Taylor said of sideline reporting. “I always say you’re in the trenches when you’re a reporter, and it’s not the most glamorous job and people don’t always give sideline reporters the credit that they probably deserve, but that’s where I kind of earned my broadcasting chops.”
While Taylor appeared on ESPN, she also worked across studio programming in reporting and hosting roles, some of which included College GameDay and NBA Countdown. Prior to the expiration of Taylor’s contract at ESPN, NBA Countdown had been slated to serve as the pregame show for the 2020 NBA Finals instead of The Jump, which was hosted by Rachel Nichols.
Shortly thereafter, a conversation took place in which Nichols suggested that ESPN should “go for it” if it wanted to give Taylor more things to do because of what she called a “crappy longtime record on diversity.” Within the conversation, Nichols stated that ESPN would not find those purported ventures for Taylor from her or in “taking my thing away.” A recording of the discussion, which took place with Adam Mendelsohn, an advisor for LeBron James and Rich Paul, was leaked one year later, captured by a video camera that was on in Nichols’ hotel room and connected to ESPN servers.
Taylor and ESPN were unable to reach a contract extension later in the month, leading to her departure from the company. Following the resolution, she subsequently agreed to a deal with NBC Sports and made her debut from the Olympic Games in Tokyo, Japan, which were played one year later due to the global pandemic.
One reason Taylor decided to join the NBCUniversal division was to continue appearing on marquee events while also having time off. Up until that point, she estimated working for about a decade without any time to rest, and she was seeking to reestablish balance in her life. The respite allowed Taylor to go through IVF and pregnancy to have her son earlier in the year, after which she was on maternity leave.
“I remember having a conversation with Molly Solomon and Fred Gaudelli at the time, and they were like, ‘We want that for you. We want you to have a family,’” Taylor recalled. “It was a conversation about the whole person. It wasn’t just about broadcasting. ‘Hey, you’re a great fit here and [so on].’ I could tell that NBC cared about me as a person and who I wanted to be as a wife and a mother, and they have supported it every step of the way.”
Taylor returned from maternity leave this summer to work as the late-night host during the Olympic Games Paris 2024, representing her third time being assigned to NBCUniversal coverage. Broadcasting in the shadow of the Eiffel Tower, she had the chance to converse with athletes, coaches and families. Taylor was part of the Opening Ceremony, which featured a boat parade down the River Seine with athletes representing 206 countries, an inimitable display leading into the two-week event.
“I know it was raining, but to be on the bottom of the boat, and you could just see like a Joel Embiid and LeBron James and literally everyone’s sitting down because no one can stand because they’re 7 feet tall and the boat’s not big enough for everyone,” Taylor recalled, “but it’s like these stories you couldn’t even imagine in your wildest dreams and you’re watching them play out in front of you – and that was the first day.”
Before the start of the Olympic Games, NBCUniversal announced that it had agreed to an 11-year media rights deal with the NBA to broadcast games starting in the 2025-26 season. The company will bring back the NBA on NBC property with exclusive doubleheaders, the NBA All-Star Game, six Conference Finals series and broadcasts of the WNBA and select USA Basketball men’s and women’s action.
“Everything that’s happening with sports expanding at NBC is like a beautiful thing,” Taylor said. “It was amazing to hear that Big Ten was coming into the NBC fold and to take part in that, and I think, yeah, if my company calls on me to work in the NBA space, sign me up.”
Across her hosting obligations, Taylor feels that she takes an approach of going with the flow and brings shrewd intellect imbued with comedic elements. There is a comfort level she has in making jokes and responding to some of the analysis, even if her colleagues do not foresee it coming. Through it all, she ensures not to forsake her authentic personality and conveys informed opinions and insights while also retaining the flow of the program and adapting to last-minute adjustments.
“I want to be a leader that kind of makes sure that everyone feels good about the product that they put out there,” Taylor said, “and I’m doing everything in my power to make sure that we leave feeling that way.”
In thinking about the future, Taylor hopes to leave a legacy in the business that her son, niece and nephew are able to look back on with pride. Coming off an invigorating assignment from Paris at the Olympics and assimilating into the college football and NFL seasons, she remains focused on showing up with positive energy and subsequently doing her best to impart such affectations to her colleagues and the audience.
Taylor believes she is where she’s supposed to be and that her steps are ordered, evinced through an unwavering composure embedded within her hosting acumen and vast skillset in sports media. At the same time, she also hopes to inspire the next generation of women looking to work in the sports media business, rejecting stereotypes and prejudice as she continues to shatter glass ceilings.
“I might be the first person in the seat that’s a woman for Football Night in America, but I’m not the first one that deserves to sit there,” Taylor said, “so I need to make sure that I’m occupying the space that so many other women deserve before me with the utmost respect and using it as an opportunity to further it for the next person or open up the gate for the next person.”
Derek Futterman is a former associate editor and sports media reporter for Barrett Media. He previously interned for Paramount within Showtime Networks, wrote for the Long Island Herald and served as lead sports producer at NY2C. Find him on X @derekfutterman.
