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Jordan Cornette is a tough guy. If you remember his career as a basketball player at Notre Dame, you remember his size, listed in those days at 6-9, 235 pounds. But he is also a tough guy because has dealt with some big blows in his life and somehow managed to come out stronger on the other end each time. Cornette even had a period of time where he was working with his wife and spending 24 hours a day, seven days a week with her and well, you have to think that took some toughness as well.
Cornette is now at NBC Sports after signing a long-term contract with the network. This, coming after he was one of several ESPN hosts to get laid off in the summer of 2023. Cornette said he was “blindsided” by the layoff. “I had to come to grips with it,” he said.
“It wasn’t performance based. And the ‘woe is me’ thing can last for maybe a week, but you got to pick yourself up off the mat. And it was very reassuring to me when I saw so many networks jump up to give me freelance work in the interim. I was able to basically audition for other networks and do some really cool stuff with Turner, with CBS, the CW and of course NBC.”
Cornette said the time period between leaving ESPN and ultimately signing with NBC was actually some of the most fun he has had in the business. He enjoyed the opportunity to work with several different people and do several different things.
When he was younger and a big basketball fan, Cornette said he would watch a lot of NBA and college games. And as much as he loved to watch the stars shine on the court, he found himself also really into the announcers. “I was always enthralled with the voices, Dickie V, Bob Costas, Marv Albert, equally as much as I was the Allen Iverson on the court or the MJ or the Patrick Ewing,” Cornette said.
“So, as much as I was enamored with the play, I was always equally enamored, if not maybe more so, with the voices that were describing and depicting the action. And so, to me, I think that’s probably unique. I’m a 10, 11, 12-year-old kid and maybe that was the first tell that I wanted to be in broadcasting.”
Later as a player at Notre Dame, he got another “sign” broadcasting might be the way to go. Cornette tells a great story about his head coach Mike Brey calling him in his office after a game where they lost to Syracuse who were led by Carmelo Anthony. Anthony went off in the game and Cornette was the one in charge of guarding him.
He said Brey pulled out a newspaper and pointed to all of the quotes Cornette had given afterwards “in a game where you had only a couple baskets and Carmelo went for 30!?” He said what Brey said next reinforced the idea of a media career. “If you could play the game at the level in which you get these quotes in the paper, you’d be an All-American.”
Eventually, Cornette did have to decide his playing days were over. Despite opportunities to play professionally overseas, he was ready to pursue his career, and he was willing to start out wherever he needed to in order to reach the heights he wanted to in this new venture. So, he started out on the production side, and he learned as much about “how the sausage was made” as possible.
Two years removed from college, the Big Ten Network started in 2007 and Cornette would become one of its first hires. He was working as Dave Revsine’s production assistant when he first started. “I worked my way up from production assistant to associate producer to junior producer, feature producer, and then line producing,” he said. “And I was there for five years and got the ultimate education with some very talented production people there.”
Cornette said it was at that time he realized he was ready to make the turn to the other side of the camera. “I wanted to be the one that was being produced by somebody. And so, I felt like I had really crafted an ability, and I knew what it would take to do well in front of the camera. I got a gentle push from some guys in our production bullpen at Big Ten Network to take the jump, hire an agent, and start my climb. And my first job was Campus Insiders, which is now Stadium, and then marched on from there.”
Campus Insiders is also where Cornette would meet fellow broadcaster Shae Peppler. She would not only later become his wife, but also his on-air partner when the two teamed up for a radio show when both were at ESPN. Shae Peppler Cornette is still with the company as a full-time anchor on SportsCenter.
As for Jordan’s time at ESPN and the surprise ending, he has nothing but great things to say about his time with the company. “I don’t look at the exit as much as I look at the ride,” he said. “I had six great years there. It gave me the ultimate platform. I got to work with some incredibly talented people at a network that everybody grew up watching. I look back on it and I’m grateful.”
And as for the time he spent doing a show with Shae, he said, “Working with my wife was to this day, the coolest thing I’ve ever done. We got to be the first couple to do a national radio show at ESPN on Sundays…so that was incredible. And to watch my wife take that and grow that into a SportsCenter role and I took that and grew it into what I’m doing now, it was cool.”
After the layoff, eventually Cornette had offers he had to decide between, but he knew exactly where he wanted to be. “I have an opportunity and I’m very honored, but this is where I want to be,” Cornette said he told NBC after receiving offers elsewhere. As it turned out, the feeling was mutual, and he says they were able to very quickly get a deal done.
In his new role, Cornette says he will be spreading his talents over several different areas. “I’ll be studio hosting and serving as a studio analyst for college basketball, studio hosting for college football, and studio hosting for golf with more growth within the network to come.”
As for home life, with both Cornettes thriving in their careers, he said, “We thrive in chaos, and we almost enjoy the chaos. It’s kind of how we operate. In this TV media landscape and just in the world in general, you’ve got to be able to roll with the punches. And we’ve gotten really good with that. You know, me and her, and I think any strong relationship, we survived hardship, tragedy in our lives, some great stuff, some peaks and valleys.
“And we just continue to rock on. We’ve been able to help each other in this business. I think that’s the ultimate sign of the teamwork we enjoy both in the household and in our careers, which has made us the best versions of ourselves. And I think that speaks to what a partner should truly be.”
At this moment, however, the Cornette’s are also dealing with a transition in their home. It happens on Saturdays when college football games are on. Shae is a graduate of Indiana University, which happens to be undefeated as of this writing and has long been known as a basketball school.
“It’s bull****,” Jordan says jokingly about Shae’s newfound enjoyment of college football Saturdays. “I’m like, wait a second. I thought it was Bobby Knight, Mike Davis, Mike Woodson. I thought it was only basketball there you would ever talk about, now with football?”
“She’s riding a high,” Cornette added. “And the fact that Notre Dame and Indiana could maybe play each other in the playoffs, this house may just combust.”
While the Cornette’s love to watch sports and have fun, they do also spend a lot of time working on something very near and dear to them. The tragedy Cornette spoke of happened when his brother Joel, a former standout basketball player at Butler, died suddenly of cardiac arrest in 2016 at the age of 35.
“My brother was such a force of nature,” Cornette said. “This world, sometimes it’s so divisive. He was such a unifying person that any time his name comes up, I get an ear-to-ear smile thinking about the lives he touched in his short time on this earth. And that was really the impetus and driving force for us to start this foundation, the Joel Cornette Foundation. He’d want us to charge on. He’d want us to make the world a little bit brighter, shine a light. That’s what we did with the foundation.”
As for what lies ahead for the 41-year-old Cornette, right now he says, “it is to cherish every day that I get to sit on a chair with uncalloused hands and talk about sports with like-minded people and get in front of a television and do such a dream job. And I promise to never take any day for granted. Grateful for the opportunity that NBC has given me a second go at this thing.
“I go in there every day with a big smile, grateful to do the work and try and do it to the best of my ability, both educate and entertain the audience that I’m lucky enough watches. When the rug got pulled from me at ESPN, I didn’t know what the future was going to hold. I just always said, if I ever get an opportunity to get back at it, to be grateful for every day that I’m doing it and be thankful for whoever gives me that opportunity. And that was NBC.”
