The Cal 100: No. 90 -- Michele Tafoya

Cal graduate is a five-time Sports Emmy winner who is now a spokesperson for conservative politics

We count down the top 100 individuals associated with Cal athletics, based on their impact in sports or in the world at large – a wide-open category. See if you agree.

No. 90: Michele Tafoya

Cal Sports Connection: 1988 Cal graduate who became a star TV and radio sports reporter and analyst

Claim to Fame: Five-time Sports Emmy Award winner, sideline reporter for NFL’s Monday Night Football and Sunday Night Football and currently a political spokesperson

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When you think of Monday Night Football/Sunday Night Football you think of Al Michaels, Howard Cosell, Cris Collinsworth, Don Meredith -- and Michele Tafoya.

Tafoya is a five-time Sports Emmy Award winner and the consummate sideline reporter, doing her job so well you think only of the news she is reporting, not the person relaying the message.

A 1988 graduate of Cal with a degree in mass communications, Tofoya’s first notable media assignment was as a host and reporter for KFAN-AM in Minneapolis, mostly for the Minnesota Vikings and Minnesota Gophers women’s basketball.

She joined CBS in 1994, covering a variety of college and pro sports and was a co-host of the late-night coverage of the 1998 Winter Olympics.

Tafoya joined ABC/ESPN in 2000 and became the Monday Night Football sideline reporter in 2004. 

Cal alumni Aaron Rodgers and Michele Tafoya. Photo by Denny Medley, USA TODAY Sports

She has served as a substitute host on “Pardon the Interruption” and as a panelist on “That Sports Reporters.” 

She also worked for NBC, which broadcasts Sunday Night Football. Super Bowl LVI was her final assignment, and in January 2022 she announced she was leaving NBC. Soon thereafter, Republican Minnesota gubernatorial candidate Kendall Qualls announced Tafoya would be joining his campaign as co-chair.

She has become a voice for conservative politics, and there has been speculation that she might run for public office.

Alex Shultz of SF Gate reported in February 2022 that Tafoya, during a Fox News appearance, “told her fellow panelists that she returned her college diploma from Cal, but didn't explain why.”

We can only speculate what that's about.

Republican voters have to decide if they want to let Democrats make their nominating choice for them, while ignoring Bill Barr’s warning about the risks of a second Trump term. https://t.co/hdPM6cwZk0

— Michele Tafoya (@Michele_Tafoya) May 9, 2023

The Cal 100: No. 91 -- Andy Wolfe

Cover photo of Michele Tafoya by Chuck Cook, USA TODAY Sports

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