In April 2021, Zora Stephenson stepped out of her usual sideline spot and into the broadcast booth. She made Milwaukee Bucks history that night, and her career has only grown since.
Curious about Zora Stephenson’s age, height, husband, and how a former college shooting guard became a voice on NBC Sports? This guide covers her biography, career, family life, and the facts fans search for most.
Zora Stephenson Quick Facts
The table below gives the basics at a glance. Anything not confirmed by a reliable source is marked as not publicly disclosed.
| Detail | Information |
| Full name | Zora Ayesha Burrell Stephenson |
| Known as | Zora Stephenson |
| Date of birth | October 17, 1993 |
| Age | 32 (turns 33 on October 17, 2026) |
| Birthplace | Vienna, Virginia, USA |
| Height | 5 ft 10 in (listed on her Elon roster) |
| Weight | Not publicly disclosed |
| Parents | Charles and Judith |
| High school | Oakton High School |
| College | Elon University (class of 2015) |
| Profession | Sports broadcaster and journalist |
| Employer | NBC Sports |
| Husband | Kevin Blake |
| Wedding date | April 7, 2018 (as reported by several profiles) |
| Net worth | over $200,000. |
| @zorastephenson |
Who Is Zora Stephenson?
Zora Stephenson is an American sports broadcaster who works for NBC Sports. She calls play-by-play for the WNBA and for Big Ten women’s basketball on Peacock. She also works the sidelines for Notre Dame football and Big Ten football, and she reports courtside for the NBA on NBC.
Her path was not a straight line. She started in local TV news, covering hurricanes, floods, and breaking stories. Then she moved into sports with the Milwaukee Bucks, where she covered a title run and made broadcast history.
Elon University’s athletics site says she has won six Emmy Awards. That mix of hard-news training and basketball knowledge is what sets her apart from many sports voices.
Zora Stephenson Age and Birthday
How old is Zora Stephenson? She is 32 years old as of September 2026. Elon’s athletics roster lists her birthday as October 17, 1993, so she turns 33 in about two weeks. That date also makes her a Libra.
She was born and raised in Vienna, Virginia, a suburb in Fairfax County outside Washington, D.C. Fans who follow the DMV basketball scene will know it well.
Zora Stephenson Height and Playing Weight
How tall is Zora Stephenson? Elon listed her at 5 feet 10 inches during her playing days. That is solid size for a guard, and it helped her defend and shoot over smaller players.
Her current weight has never been shared publicly. Treat any site that gives a precise number with caution.
Early Life and Family
Basketball ran through her childhood. She has said her earliest memories of the game come from cul-de-sac pick-up games with cousins who were older and much taller. Nobody famous sparked her love of the sport. It was simply what her family did.
Zora Stephenson Parents
Her parents are Charles Stephenson and Judith Burrell, according to her Elon biography. She and her father had a Friday night habit of going to high school basketball games around Fairfax County to watch local talent. Her parents also pushed her to visit as many colleges as she could during recruiting.
Beyond that, she keeps details about siblings and extended family private. The public record only confirms her parents’ names and the close-knit, basketball-loving household she describes.
Basketball Career at Oakton and Elon
She was a real player, not a broadcaster who once shot around. Her numbers back that up.
High School Standout at Oakton
At Oakton High School, she scored 1,463 career points and set a school record with 263 three-pointers. The Cougars went 101-8 during her career, won four district titles and three region titles, and reached the state final in 2008-09. She was a McDonald’s All-American nominee and earned Washington Post All-Metro honors as a junior and senior. She also played AAU ball for Boo Williams.
College Basketball at Elon University
Envelopes from Division I schools filled the family mailbox. One read “Phoenix,” and she assumed it came from Arizona. She had never heard of Elon. After a quick campus visit, she felt at home and committed.
She played for the Elon Phoenix from 2011 to 2015 and appeared in 121 games as a three-year starter. As a freshman in 2011-12, she shot 42.3% from three-point range (33 of 78), which set an Elon single-season record and led the conference. That season she also poured in a career-high 28 points against Virginia Intermont.
Her junior year was even bigger. She started 29 games, made 67 threes, averaged 10.1 points, and won the team’s Most Improved award. She also earned the Southern Conference Commissioner’s Medal and Academic All-Conference honors.
Education: Zora Stephenson at Elon
Her degree was in the communications field, and she treated school like a second full-time job. Between practices, she worked on the student outlets Elon Local News and Elon Phoenix Weekly. She has joked about running from practice to a shower and then straight to the studio to deliver a sports segment.
She also served as a resident assistant, tour guide, and tutor. Head coach Charlotte Smith backed her outside interests, even allowing summer internships that meant missing some workouts. She graduated in the spring of 2015 and has said she’ll always be grateful for that support.
Zora Stephenson’s Career: From Local News to the Bucks
Her early job history explains why she sounds so prepared on air.
Starting Out in Local TV News
Right after graduation in 2015, she became a reporter at WNCT-TV in Greenville, North Carolina. She covered hurricanes and floods, and she won the Radio Television Digital News Association of the Carolinas’ Reporter of the Year award in 2016.
After two years, she moved to Denver as a reporter and anchor for FOX31 (KDVR) and Colorado’s Own Channel 2. Hard news came with heavy days. She covered the aftermath of the 2019 STEM School Highlands Ranch shooting, and in 2018 she interviewed a suspect in the Watts family case shortly before he confessed. She has said those years taught her empathy and how to work under pressure.
Joining the Milwaukee Bucks
In the fall of 2019, the Bucks hired her as a sideline reporter for Bally Sports Wisconsin (now FOX Sports Wisconsin) and as a digital reporter, with a storytelling role attached. She also contributed to WTMJ Radio, The Truth, and ESPN Radio in Milwaukee.
Her favorite story from that first season had nothing to do with box scores. In January 2020, the Bucks visited the Racine Correctional Institution, where players, coaches, and incarcerated men sat together and then played a basketball game. She produced a five-minute package on the day, and it earned one of her Emmys.
The Night the Bucks Sat Out
On August 26, 2020, Milwaukee players chose not to play a playoff game against the Orlando Magic after the shooting of Jacob Blake in nearby Kenosha. Stephenson was the remote sideline reporter and helped fill three hours of live airtime while the story changed by the minute.
She has said she leaned on her own perspective as a Black woman to add context, which broke from the neutral style she was trained in. She calls it some of her most meaningful work.
Making History as the First Woman to Call a Bucks Game
Longtime Bucks announcer Jim Paschke first floated the idea over a socially distanced lunch in summer 2020. She thought he was joking. Then she practiced by calling old games into a recorder and hated how she sounded at first.
The team later let her call unaired practice games. On April 9, 2021, she became the first woman to call a regular-season Bucks game as the play-by-play broadcaster, working beside former Bucks star Marques Johnson. Milwaukee lost 127-119 to Charlotte, but the milestone mattered more than the score.
A few months later, the Bucks won the 2021 NBA championship. She was on the court for the celebration, interviewed Finals MVP Giannis Antetokounmpo, and hosted the title parade in front of a crowd of roughly 60,000.
Zora Stephenson at NBC Sports
Her NBC Sports role has grown every year. One small note: NBC’s own bio says she joined in 2021, while Elon’s athletics feature dates her move to the fall of 2023. Her Bucks work ran through 2023, so sources differ on the exact start.
College Basketball and the Caitlin Clark Record
She calls Big Ten women’s basketball for Peacock. In her first year, she was on the call on February 15, 2024, when Iowa’s Caitlin Clark broke the NCAA Division I women’s career scoring record. She has joked that she still has confetti from that night in her backpack.
Olympics and Sports Emmy
At the 2022 Beijing Winter Games, she worked as an NBC Olympics social media host. At the Paris 2024 Summer Olympics, she reported on basketball and gymnastics, including the U.S. teams’ gold-medal runs. She also won a Sports Emmy as part of NBCUniversal’s Paris coverage, which took home Outstanding Live Special, Championship Event.
Football and NBA Coverage
On football Saturdays, she is a sideline reporter for Notre Dame and Big Ten games. During the 2025-26 season, she worked as a courtside reporter for the NBA on NBC. She also joined Ashley ShahAhmadi as a sideline reporter for the 2026 NBA All-Star Game.
Calling the WNBA in 2026
The biggest step came on April 16, 2026, when NBC Sports named her one of three play-by-play voices for its return to the WNBA, alongside Noah Eagle and Michael Grady. It is NBC’s first WNBA season since 2002 and her first full-time pro play-by-play role. The 2026 postseason includes NBC and Peacock semifinal games, with the first on October 4.
She has also called New York Liberty games, according to NBC’s announcement.
Zora Stephenson Career Timeline
| Year | Milestone |
| 2011 to 2015 | Plays guard at Elon University |
| 2015 | Graduates and joins WNCT-TV in Greenville, N.C. |
| 2016 | Named RTDNA Carolinas Reporter of the Year |
| 2017 to 2019 | Reporter and anchor in Denver |
| Fall 2019 | Hired by the Milwaukee Bucks |
| August 2020 | Reports remotely during the Bucks’ playoff boycott |
| April 9, 2021 | First woman to call a regular-season Bucks game |
| July 2021 | Bucks win the NBA title; she hosts the parade |
| 2022 | Hosts social media for NBC at the Beijing Winter Games |
| February 15, 2024 | Calls Caitlin Clark’s record-breaking game |
| Summer 2024 | Reports at the Paris Olympics; wins a Sports Emmy |
| 2025-26 | Courtside reporter for the NBA on NBC |
| May 2026 | Begins as a WNBA play-by-play voice on NBC |
Awards and Honors
Here are the honors that are easy to verify:
- Six Emmy Awards overall, per her Elon profile
- Sports Emmy for NBCUniversal’s Paris 2024 Olympics coverage
- RTDNA Carolinas Reporter of the Year in 2016
- Elon single-season three-point percentage record (2011-12)
- Southern Conference Commissioner’s Medal
- McDonald’s All-American nominee and Washington Post All-Metro honors
Zora Stephenson Husband: Meet Kevin Blake
Zora Stephenson’s husband is Kevin Blake. The two met at Elon. He played men’s basketball for the Phoenix and now serves as Elon’s Assistant Athletics Director for Business Operations.
Blake has shared a story from their college days. When it snowed, she didn’t see a day off. She saw a news story and pulled him in as her cameraman. He said she is “a person of preparedness,” and not a perfectionist.
Several profiles report the couple married on April 7, 2018. Elon’s own article confirms he is her husband but does not list a wedding date, so treat the date as reported rather than officially confirmed.
Does Zora Stephenson Have Children?
No source confirms that Zora Stephenson has children. She keeps her family life private, and she has not shared details about kids in the interviews and official bios reviewed for this profile.
Zora Stephenson Net Worth
Zora Stephenson’s net worth has not been publicly disclosed. Some websites publish dollar figures, but they rarely explain where the numbers come from, so they are guesses at best.
Her main public job is her NBC Sports role, and a talent agency also lists her for event bookings. Treat any exact number you see online as an estimate, not a fact.
Zora Stephenson on Social Media
She is active on Instagram (@zorastephenson) and on X (@ZoraStephenson), where she shares game-day moments, behind-the-scenes clips, and career updates. Her feed leans toward basketball, football, and the events she covers rather than heavy personal posting.
What Makes Zora Stephenson Stand Out
Preparation is the word that follows her around. She builds detailed spotting boards and charts before games, even though she rarely uses every note on air. She says the repetition builds confidence.
She also credits her news years for her storytelling. Her view is simple: if you know how to tell a story, you can tell it about politics, weather, or the NBA. And she stays humble about her playing days, joking that she can’t compare with the athletes she covers.
Where to Watch Zora Stephenson
You can catch her in several places this fall and winter:
- WNBA on NBC and Peacock, including the 2026 postseason games
- Notre Dame and Big Ten football on NBC, as a sideline reporter
- NBA on NBC, as a courtside reporter
- Big Ten women’s basketball on Peacock
Which of her calls is your favorite so far? Drop it in the comments and share this profile with a fellow basketball fan.
Zora Stephenson Fast Facts
- Born October 17, 1993, in Vienna, Virginia
- Listed at 5 feet 10 inches at Elon
- Daughter of Charles and Judith
- Played four seasons of Division I basketball at Elon (2011 to 2015)
- Began her career at WNCT-TV in Greenville, N.C.
- Joined the Milwaukee Bucks in fall 2019
- First woman to call a regular-season Bucks game (April 9, 2021)
- Holds six Emmy Awards, including a Sports Emmy for Paris 2024
- Married to Kevin Blake, an Elon athletics administrator
- Play-by-play voice for the WNBA on NBC in 2026
Conclusion
Zora Stephenson built her career the hard way. She went from Oakton and Elon hardwood to breaking news in North Carolina and Colorado, then to Milwaukee, where she made history in the Bucks’ booth.
Today she is a lead voice at NBC Sports, with the WNBA, the Olympics, and the NBA on her résumé. Her age, height, and husband draw the searches, but her preparation and storytelling explain why she keeps moving up.
Frequently Asked Questions About Zora Stephenson
How old is Zora Stephenson?
She is 32 years old. Her birthday is October 17, 1993, so she turns 33 in 2026.
How tall is Zora Stephenson?
She was listed at 5 feet 10 inches on Elon’s women’s basketball roster.
Who is Zora Stephenson’s husband?
Her husband is Kevin Blake, a former Elon men’s basketball player who now works in the university’s athletics department.
Where did Zora Stephenson go to college?
She attended Elon University in North Carolina, played four years of basketball, and graduated in 2015.
Was Zora Stephenson the first woman to call a Bucks game?
Yes. On April 9, 2021, she became the first woman to call a regular-season Milwaukee Bucks game as the play-by-play broadcaster.
What does Zora Stephenson do at NBC Sports?
She calls WNBA and Big Ten women’s basketball play-by-play, reports on the sidelines for football, and works courtside for the NBA on NBC.
Does Zora Stephenson have kids?
No children have been publicly confirmed.
What is Zora Stephenson’s net worth?
Her net worth is not publicly disclosed, and online figures are unverified estimates.