Doris Burke

Doris Burke is a Hall of Fame broadcaster and the lead analyst for the NBA on ESPN and ABC. In 2024, Burke will become the first woman to serve as a game analyst on television for a championship final in one of the four major professional U.S. sports leagues.

In 2020, Burke became the first woman to serve as a game analyst for the NBA Finals when she provided commentary on ESPN Radio. Prior to the 2017-18 NBA season, ESPN named Doris Burke to the position of national NBA game analyst, making her the first woman to serve full time in that capacity.

In 2018, Burke was announced as a recipient of the prestigious Curt Gowdy Media Award by the Naismith Memorial Hall of Fame.

During Burke’s ESPN tenure, she has served as a top commentator on several significant ESPN properties, including the NBA, women’s and men’s college basketball and the WNBA. She also served as the lead sideline reporter for the NBA Finals on ABC. Burke has covered basketball for ESPN since 1991 and has been the recipient of several awards and honors, including the 2017 WISE Women of the Year Award.

Burke previously served as a WNBA analyst for the New York Liberty on MSG Network and also was a women’s college basketball analyst for CBS Sports (1998-2001) and Westwood One Radio (2000-02). The first woman to call Knicks radio/television broadcast (2000) and a BIG EAST men’s basketball game on television, Burke was a frequent columnist for Basketball Times Magazine and Eastern Basketball Magazine since 2001 as well as a contributing writer on the website for the Center for Sports Parenting.

From 1990-2000, Burke was an analyst on regional coverage of BIG EAST and Atlantic-10 women’s basketball on the New England Sports Network (NESN), Prime or SportsChannel. She also worked for the Atlantic-10 Men’s Basketball Network (1999-2001), the MAAC Women’s Basketball Network (1997-99) and ECAC men’s and women’s weekly telecasts (1995-97). She served as a play-by-play commentator for Providence College women’s basketball on WICE/WNPW Radio (1990-97) and Providence College men’s basketball with WPRO Radio (1992-95). She spent three years as a women’s basketball analyst with the Penn State Television Network (1993-95). A former basketball standout at Providence College who held seven records upon graduation, Burke finished her career as the school and conference all-time assists leader (602), Providence’s single-season leader in assists (224), and single-season (152) and career (440) leader in free throws. She served as an assistant coach for her Alma mater for two years (1988-90).

In 2000, she was inducted into the Providence College Hall of Fame, and she received an honorary doctorate from the school in 2005. In 2002, the Institute for International Sport named Burke one of 15 Sports Ethics Fellows and in 2004 inducted her into the Scholar-Athlete Hall of Fame. In 2006, she was inducted into the New England Basketball Hall of Fame, and in 2007 she was honored with the Woman of Excellence Trailblazer Award from the Rhode Island Women’s Center. Raised in Manasquan, N.J., Burke graduated from Providence College with a degree in health service administration/social work and also earned her master’s in education at Providence.