FALL 2024
Hoop Dreams
A sportscaster gives students the play-by-play of her career.
Malika Andrews answers a question from Kimberly Cortez, the Beacon’s current editor-in-chief. Photo credit: Chris Brecht
THIS SEPTEMBER, MALIKA ANDREWS ’17, host of ESPN’s NBA Today and NBA Countdown, returned to The Bluff for the first time since graduating.
A lot has happened in her career during that time, much of it in the public eye after she made the decision to pivot from print sports journalism (The New York Times and Chicago Tribune) to television. During the pandemic, she became one of the few journalists allowed into the “NBA bubble,” reporting on the 2020 playoffs for ESPN. She rose to the occasion in what, let’s hope, was a once-in-a-lifetime global health crisis. Thanks to her poise and special rapport with players, Andrews became the first woman to host the NBA draft, in 2022. All of these jobs come with scrutiny and pressure, but she has handled it all with intense preparation, authenticity, and grace.
Her question-and-answer meeting with Beacon reporters and student athletes was something of a masterclass for all who were listening closely. And she took a moment to walk with the Beacon staff and advisor Nancy Copic to the Beacon newsroom, where her career began. (Andrews started as a Beacon sports reporter, then became sports editor, and then became editor-in-chief. She likes to say she “majored in the Beacon.”) And she then spoke to a larger crowd at Buckley Auditorium in a conversation moderated by the legendary Ann Schatz, Portland’s first female sportscaster.
From a distance, you’d be forgiven for thinking that Andrews’ career has been all rise, though of course there were decisions and disappointments, moments of going-with-your-gut without knowing the path ahead, not to mention moments of public criticism. Andrews was open about how she’s navigated all of it. Schatz noted the deep humanity of Andrews’ reporting, and Andrews spoke of her continued hope to respect and elevate the person she’s interviewing, to be driven not by the goal of being “the best,” but to be driven by the goal to serve “the greater good.”
We’ll continue to cheer her on from the sidelines, no matter where her career takes her next.