In her line of work, Maria Taylor can’t climb much higher than she’s already ascended.
This fall, she’ll begin her third season as full-time studio host of NBC’s “Football Night in America,” the most watched prime-time show on television. Starting next Friday, the former two-sport athlete at Georgia (and before that a star at Centennial High) will be a fixture on screens everywhere as she’ll be NBC’s late-night host at the Paris Olympics.
Her first major assignment will be during the opening ceremony, which in a highly anticipated change will not be in a stadium but instead on the Seine River. Taylor will be stationed on the boat carrying the U.S. team. It is literally the first time any broadcaster has ever had this assignment, and NBC selected Taylor for it.
The 37-year-old Taylor, who grew up in Alpharetta and lives in Buckhead with her husband, Jon Hemphill, and infant son Roman Ryan Taylor Hemphill (born in December), has reached heights in her business attained by few broadcasters, fewer women and no African American women. None of it is lost on Taylor, who first caught the sports bug when her mother took her to watch events at the 1996 Summer Games in Atlanta.
“Everyone works hard,” Taylor said in a recent phone interview with The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. “I’m aware of so many people that are extremely talented at this job and sometimes I do ask myself, like, ‘How did I end up getting to be the one to host ‘Football Night in America’ or be in any way associated with Sunday night or the Olympics?’”
Taylor may have reached the pinnacle of her field. But she hasn’t forgotten the young girl who took in women’s basketball, track and field and other events at the Atlanta Olympics and imagined what could be or the college graduate who aspired to make it in a field dominated by people who didn’t look like her.
“And so for young girls to sit at home and turn on the TV and be like, ‘Oh, yeah, we can do that, easy. That’s easy.’ - that means everything to me,” Taylor said. “And when there are hard days, that’s kind of what keeps me going.”
It’s been a long - if relatively quick - climb for Taylor, who graduated from UGA’s Grady College of Journalism and Mass Communication in 2009. Coming out of Centennial, Taylor had plans of studying to become a team doctor to stay connected with sports, but biology classes got the better of her. A rough go with accounting convinced her the business-school path wasn’t for her, either. But she said that a pre-match interview with a broadcast crew for a Bulldogs volleyball competition opened her eyes to a new possibility.
“I just remember thinking, I was like, ‘Wow, if this is a job, I want to do that,’ “ Taylor said. “ ‘I want to get paid to talk to athletes and talk about the match.’ “
So began the push to a career in broadcasting, one continually supported by her alma mater. She started humbly, working as a production assistant for the UGA athletic department website. She interviewed coaches and athletes, lugging her own camera and editing video.
When the since-shuttered cable channel Comcast Sports Southeast called Georgia looking for a volleyball analyst, her colleagues pushed for her. A fellow alumnus - ESPN’s Mark Schlabach, a former AJC sportswriter - provided a connection to ESPN, where she began in 2012. There, she climbed the ladder to co-host “College GameDay,” the first Black woman to earn that assignment on one of the network’s premier shows.
It has engendered a deep loyalty to the school, from which she also earned an MBA in 2013. She called the honor of delivering the undergraduate commencement address at UGA in May 2021 a career highlight.
“Hands down,” she said. “Because I feel like I owe it.”
Taylor may ask herself how she was the one to earn the hosting job for “Football Night in America” (her seat previously was occupied by three industry giants - Bob Costas, Dan Patrick and Mike Tirico) or the Olympic assignment. To many, it’s not hard to figure out. Ask someone who calls himself Taylor’s biggest fan - Georgia women’s basketball coaching legend Andy Landers.
“Honestly, I am overwhelmed with one particular thought every time I see her,” Landers told The AJC. “And that is how good she is.”
Landers is Taylor’s former coach (she also played volleyball for the Bulldogs) and remains a close friend. But he also is someone who worked alongside Taylor on women’s basketball studio shows at SEC Network and ESPN. He knows more than a little about the business and has seen her at work.
He sees how her warmth puts interview subjects at ease. (Landers first saw it when, soon after he brought her over from the UGA volleyball team to add depth to his injury-depleted squad, she quickly became friends with everyone on the team.)
He saw her level of preparation before and during broadcasts. He knows how well she runs a studio show, sensing the rhythm of the conversation and asking questions of analysts that will let them shine.
And he saw how ambitious she was at ESPN, seeking challenges and performing with excellence.
“She told ‘em, ‘I want to do it all,’ “ Landers said. “And when they saw how good she was, they put her on everything.”
Taylor broke barriers at ESPN. Where women largely have been confined to covering women’s sports or serving as sideline reporters for men’s sports, Taylor earned hosting spots on male-dominated shows like “College GameDay” and “NBA Countdown.” It was not an accident; Taylor said she first went to SEC Network because she wanted to learn how to host a studio show.
“I wanted my bosses to look at me and say, ‘Hey, you can do anything,’ “ she said.
Her run at ESPN did not end well, however. In 2021, the New York Times published a story that included a leaked private conversation involving ESPN NBA show host Rachel Nichols from 2020 in which Nichols (who is white) made comments suggesting that Taylor had gotten the job hosting “NBA Countdown” for that year’s NBA Finals because she is Black.
It created tension for Taylor, who left for NBC shortly after the Times story broke following the expiration of her ESPN contract. She looks back on the episode with perspective, calling it part of her evolution and testimony and saying that she needed a new place to start.
“I’ve always wanted to work the Olympics, but never thought I could,” she said. “A door had to close for me to walk through this brilliant future that I’ve been able to stand in. And I’m so thankful for it.”
Taylor acknowledged that her career could not have happened without ESPN and that “I love all the people that I met” there. But leaving the network has opened up a new realm of opportunities. As ESPN does not hold broadcast rights to the Olympics, she could not have been a host for that event. Before NBC, she said, the possibility of a woman (much less Taylor herself) hosting “Football Night in America” was not even in her train of thought. She now also hosts the pregame show for NBC’s Big Ten football broadcasts. And with NBC close to finalizing a deal to start broadcasting NBA games in 2025, it wouldn’t be a surprise to see Taylor be a big part of that package.
“There’s some things that we hold onto that no longer serve us and when we let them go, you’re going to find something else that is a beautiful future,” Taylor said. “And that’s what I feel like I’ve found here (at NBC).”
During the Olympics, Taylor will be hosting from a variety of locations in Paris, including competition venues and famous landmarks. It will be her third Olympics with NBC. She is eager to tell the stories - some of them anticipated, some of them to be a surprise - of the world’s greatest sports event. One of her favorites is that of U.S. swimmer Simone Manuel, the first Black female to win an individual Olympic swimming gold medal who overcame a debilitating condition (overtraining syndrome) to make her third Olympic team.
“I know it’s a special place to be,” Taylor said, “and to be able to present the world’s games back home to our country, that’s something that I view as a great responsibility and an awesome opportunity.”
Twenty-eight years after a formative experience at the Atlanta Games, Taylor is living her own Olympian triumph.
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