Sports Media Summit Speakers
The Future of Sports Business and Careers
Presented by the College of Communication, Media, Design and Information
听听March 5鈥6, 2026
听听Location: Touchdown Club, Folsom Field
Join us for a focused, high-energy, two-day event designed to connect CU 抖阴传媒在线 students, alumni, faculty, and the Colorado sports and media community. Expect candid discussions on industry trends, career pathways, emerging technologies and networking.
Speaker bios for the Sports Media Summit were submitted by the presenters and/or their affiliated organizations. The College of Communication, Media, Design and Information did not author or edit these materials.
Justin Adams
Justin Adams is a proud Denver native, award-winning journalist and Colorado Sports Hall of Fame member. Justin can be seen on television working as a morning news and sports reporter/anchor for CBS News Colorado. He also serves as a play-by-play broadcaster for the Mountain West Network and Altitude Sports. His work spans television, radio and streaming from FOX Sports Radio, SiriusXM and Denver Sports 104.3 The Fan, to the Pac-12 Network, FloSports and Black Entertainment Television. Last year he helped induct Theodore 鈥淏ubbles鈥 Anderson, the only Colorado native to play in the Negro Leagues, into the Colorado Sports Hall of Fame. A former Colorado Buffaloes tight end and two-time Big 12 North champion, Justin is passionate about preserving sports history, mentoring young athletes, and telling stories that matter. He is married to his wife Niki Adams and is a proud father to Justin Jr. (6) and Brooke (3).
Jeremy Bloom
Jeremy Bloom is the only athlete in history to ski in the Olympics and be drafted into the NFL. He is a three-time World Champion, two-time Olympian, NFL draft pick, and entrepreneur. He founded Integrate, a B2B enterprise software company acquired for $350M, co-founded Owl.ai with Sergey Brin to bring AI judging to sports, and launched Wish of a Lifetime, a nonprofit acquired by AARP. Bloom is CEO of X Games, leading its transformation into the future of action sports.
Tad Boyle
Tad Boyle is in his 16th year as the head coach of the University of Colorado men鈥檚 basketball program with a record of 312-204 (.605). He is Colorado's all-time leader in men's basketball coaching wins and second in win percentage.
Entering his 20th overall season as a collegiate head coach, Boyle has won 58 percent of his games with a record of 368-270.
Boyle owns 10 of Colorado鈥檚 14 all-time seasons of 20-plus wins, including all six of the Buffaloes鈥 top single-season win totals. He has guided Colorado to 13 postseason appearances in 14 possible seasons; with no postseason in 2020 due to covid. Included in that span is a school-record seven-straight appearances from 2011 to 2017. Prior to that seven-year run, no Colorado team had participated in the postseason more than two consecutive years.
Dave Briggs
Dave Briggs is a veteran television anchor with national stops at FOX News, CNN, NBC Sports, Turner Sports, and Yahoo Finance. For good measure he even played an ATN news anchor on HBO鈥檚 Succession. Dave creates and hosts branded and independent podcasts, including the Saatva Superpower Podcast, where he interviews Olympic athletes 鈥 in bed. He serves as a content consultant for Dwayne 鈥淭he Rock鈥 Johnson鈥檚 Teremana Tequila and is a Live Events Producer and Trustee at the Westport Public Library.
Jason Dachman
Dachman oversees all aspects of SVG's North American editorial operations 鈥 including all news on sportsvideo.org and the daily SVG Insider newsletter 鈥 and is one of the primary contributors to SVG's coverage of the sports-video-production industry. A member of the SVG team since 2009, Dachman also serves as Program Director for SVG's Esports Production Forum, Regional Sports Production Summit, Sports Content Management Forum, Sports Graphics Forum, and TranSPORT conference. Prior to joining SVG, he covered local sports for The Patriot Ledger in Quincy, MA, and served on the production staff of SiriusXM's The Ron & Fez Show. Dachman began his career in the Sports Information department at Northeastern University in Boston, where he earned a BA in Media Communications and Cinema Studies. A native of Denver, CO, Jason currently resides in Queens, NY, with his wife Alyson and two children.
Kartik Dakshinamoorthy
Kartik is an award-winning international set designer, business leader, speaker, and President & Co-Owner of Devlin Design Group. Over the last 26 years, Kartik has built a reputation for translating ambitious ideas into dynamic physical and virtual environments that elevate storytelling and engage audiences.
Known for his ability to synthesize diverse inputs into cohesive, high-impact design solutions, Kartik has led creative direction for major broadcast, sports, and live production clients across the United States and internationally. Under his leadership, DDG has delivered innovative studio environments that combine design excellence with operational practicality.
Within the sports media space, Kartik has collaborated with leading broadcasters, leagues, and production partners to design high-performance studios and event environments that support live game coverage, analysis, and championship-level programming. His work reflects the evolving demands of modern sports production where technology, storytelling, and fan engagement intersect.
Based in Colorado, he is proud to contribute to the Front Range鈥檚 growing sports media ecosystem working alongside mobile production, and network operations teams that power live sports nationwide.
Kartik鈥檚 work has earned numerous industry honors, including multiple Emmy Awards, Set of the Year recognitions, GEMA/PROMAX Gold Awards, and Telly Awards.
A passionate collaborator and optimist, Kartik is energized by the question, 鈥淲hat if?鈥 鈥 the starting point for many of his most innovative solutions. Whether pushing the boundaries of scenic design or exploring new applications of virtual and hybrid production, he is driven by curiosity, creativity, and a commitment to excellence.
Michael Davies
Michael Davies is Executive Vice President of Technical and Field Operations at FOX Sports, where he leads the teams behind the network's live sports broadcasts 鈥 from marquee events like the Super Bowl and FIFA World Cup to the regional and remote productions that form the week-to-week backbone of what FOX Sports
Delivers. With more than two decades in sports television 鈥 including ten years at HBO Sports before joining FOX in 2006 鈥 Davies has built his career around two things: putting great teams in a position to do great work, and staying curious about what technology makes possible before it becomes conventional. That approach has led to multiple patents and a long track record of innovation across some of the biggest productions in the world. Since 2019, he has served as Chairman of the Sports Video Group. His work has been recognized with multiple
Sports Emmy Awards across NFL, NASCAR, MLB, and FIFA coverage.
He lives between Los Angeles, CA and Sperryville, V A with his partner Cecilia and son, Kai.
Cassidy Davis
Cassidy Davis graduated from CU 抖阴传媒在线 in Fall 2023 with a bachelor鈥檚 degree in Strategic Communications and double minors in Sports Media and Creative Technology & Design. During her time on campus, she completed multiple internships across collegiate and professional sports, contributing to marketing efforts for the Colorado Avalanche, Denver Nuggets, Colorado Rapids, and CU Athletics. After graduation, Cassidy joined the Seattle Seahawks as a Corporate Partnerships intern, a role that quickly paved the way to her current position as the team鈥檚 Corporate Partnerships Coordinator where she most recently won her first Super Bowl Champion title!
Camden Dempsey
Camden Dempsey is a real estate investor, entrepreneur, and incoming Schwarzman Scholar at Tsinghua University in Beijing. He earned his bachelor鈥檚 degree and Master of Science in Real Estate from the 抖阴传媒在线, where he was also a multi-year letterman on the Colorado Buffaloes football team. Camden previously co-founded VerEstate, a proptech startup focused on modernizing the title and closing experience, and has worked across real estate finance, development, and venture ecosystems. His long-term interests center on global real estate markets, entrepreneurship, and the intersection of capital, technology, and urban growth, particularly between the U.S. and China.
Stephanie Dessart
厂迟茅辫丑补苍颈别 is a broadcast technology professional with over 20 years at EVS Broadcast Equipment. She has extensive experience in solutions architecture and product strategy across the whole EVS portfolio.
Nick Garvin
Nick Garvin is Chief Executive Officer at Mobile TV Group (MTVG). Nick oversees all of MTVG鈥檚 operations, which include over half of all NBA, MLB, and NHL broadcasts across the country and more than 4,500 live events annually. Based in Denver, MTVG has offered high-quality broadcast engineering for nearly 30 years.听
In June 2025, Nick launched the Mountain Media Center (MMC) in Centennial, CO 鈥 Nick's vision for creating a complete media ecosystem that would advance live production standards. The state-of-the-art facility was designed not only as a production hub but as a comprehensive center offering education alongside a full suite of media services. Built with specialized infrastructure including redundant power systems, robust fiber connectivity, and flexible technical spaces, the MMC serves as the premier destination for live broadcast excellence in the United States. Nick plans to provide training and educational programs to cultivate the next generation of broadcast professionals.
This ecosystem approach builds on MTVG's track record of innovation. In 2020, under Nick鈥檚 leadership, the company introduced Cloud Control, the first fully remote production managed service, allowing clients to go live from over 3,000 miles away from on-site events without making any production or staffing sacrifices.
Nick is a member of Forbes鈥 2018 30 Under 30 class and continues to lead and inspire MTVG as it innovates the live production industry. Outside of MTVG, Nick Garvin founded Stackup, an educational technology startup using AI to deliver metrics on students鈥 digital reading and learning progress to thousands of schools across the United States. Stackup was named the Denver Post鈥檚 Tech Startup of the Year in 2016 and was acquired in 2021. In addition to being named to the 2018 Forbes 30 Under 30 list, Nick was also recognized in Denver Business Journal's and L.A. TV Week's 40 Under 40 classes in 2023. Nick holds a Bachelor of Science in Business Administration from the Eller College of Management, along with an executive education from the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania.
Bevan Gibson
Bevan Gibson serves as the Executive Vice President of Sales & Operations for North America at EVS, where he supports the sales and operations teams in navigating the evolving broadcast and media landscape. With a professional background built on engineering, Bevan previously held several technical and operational roles with global service providers and broadcasters across Europe and the Middle East. This international experience helps him bring a practical, grounded perspective to the challenges of modern live production.
In his current role, Bevan focuses on fostering regional growth and ensuring that EVS continues to provide reliable, high-quality technology for its partners. Based in the United States, he is committed to strengthening the company鈥檚 local presence and supporting the talented teams that deliver EVS鈥檚 pioneering live video solutions to sports and media productions throughout North America.
Sam Goodell
Head of Data & Analytics department at Optimum Sports, focusing on sports media strategy and data science applications.听 Current MS-DS 鈥27 student at CU 抖阴传媒在线 with 10+ years of experience in marketing analytics.听
Alex Hay
Alex Hay is an internationally experienced leader in the Sports, Entertainment & Media space. Currently based in New York, Alex leads commercial and strategy at LiveLike, focusing on providing fan engagement experiences and AI personalization听 across Sports teams, Leagues and Broadcasters.
Alicia Jessop
Alicia Jessop is an attorney, founder of the media platform Ruling Sports, and a tenured Professor at Pepperdine University. As an attorney, Alicia helps clients develop and preserve their legacies. She represents college and professional athletes, influencers, broadcasters and businesses in a range of transactional and intellectual property matters, including sponsorship and NIL negotiation; business formation and transactions; company acquisitions and trademark law. Alicia also practices estate law, where she counsels members of her community on ensuring their legacies extend beyond their lives. She presently serves as the Co-Chair of the Sports Division of the American Bar Association鈥檚 Forum
on the Entertainment and Sports Industries. In 2025 she was named a Fellow of the American Bar Foundation, an invitation-only recognition awarded to less than 1% of attorneys in the U.S.
Founding Ruling Sports in 2011, Alicia has spent over a decade as a sport journalist. She has been a contributor to The Athletic, The Washington Post, Forbes, CNBC, Huffington Post and听. Through these roles, she was one of the few female sports writers credentialed for events including, the Super Bowl, NBA Finals, NBA All-Star Game, Indianapolis 500, Final Four and more.
As a scholar, Alicia鈥檚 research centers on athlete well-being. She is the Program Chair of the Sport Administration program at Pepperdine University. Through her research, she has work with several U.S. Congresspeople and Senators to draft proposed federal legislation to protect athletes鈥 rights. From 2023-2025 she was one of 16 appointed members to the NCAA鈥檚 Division I Men鈥檚 Basketball Oversight Committee. Alicia is a past-President of the Sport and Recreation Law
Association and serves on the editorial boards of the听Journal of Legal Aspects of Sport听and the听Journal of Global Sport Management.
Alicia is a 2006 alumna of the Colorado School of Mines, where she was the second female Student Body President in the university鈥檚 history, and 2009 alumna of Chapman University School of Law. She is a member of Sigma Kappa Sorority, the Junior League of Denver and supports several organizations working to end the orphan cycle and foster economic growth in Haiti.
Blake Lawrence
Blake Lawrence is the co-founder and President of Collegiate Operations at Opendorse, the athlete marketplace and NIL company. A leading expert on athlete marketing, Lawrence has helped over 140,000 athletes build and monetize their NIL value for the past decade. In his role as President of Collegiate Operations, Lawrence works hand-in-hand with athletic directors and department leaders across the college sports landscape to establish and maximize their NIL operations.
Lawrence and his co-founder, Adi Kunalic, are two-time entrepreneurs having started Hurrdat, a digital marketing agency, in 2010. Prior to his journey as an entrepreneur, Lawrence was a starting football player at the University of Nebraska before his career was cut short due to recurring concussions. Following the end of his on-field career, Lawrence finished his BA and earned his MBA at Nebraska, then dove head-first into the business world with the vision to help every athlete.
Tom McGovern
With over 35 years of leadership in sports media and sponsorship, I鈥檝e helped shape some of the industry鈥檚 most influential programs and partnerships. Throughout my career, I鈥檝e managed one of the largest sports media budgets in the business鈥攐ften overseeing up to 30% of Super Bowl inventory鈥攁nd collaborated with world-class brands to deliver groundbreaking campaigns. Highlights include developing the State Farm Sports Strategy, AT&T NCAA/CFP initiatives, Pepsi Super Bowl activations, Doritos鈥 Crash the Super Bowl, FedEx Orange Bowl, FedEx Cup, Mountain Dew Action Sports, Nissan Heisman, The launch of Draft Kings Sportsbook and pioneering Apple iPad鈥檚 sideline technology integration.
I began my career at BBDO, gaining a full-service agency foundation that shaped my expertise in media, negotiation, and client management.听
Later, as part of the founding team at OMD in the U.S., I led Sports Investment during a pivotal era when leagues and media companies expanded into cable and digital assets. During my tenure i negotiated large scale enterprise level partnerships with all major media companies across a number of sports.
In 2002, I co-founded Optimum Sports鈥攖he first sports marketing agency built on media principles鈥攍everaging media spend to create value beyond price. Under my leadership, Optimum grew to 150+ professionals across New York, Chicago, and Los Angeles, servicing 25+ major brands, a media portfolio of over $3Billion and managing 250+ partnerships across the NFL, NBA, MLB, WNBA, MLS, NWSL, and the Olympics. We drove innovation through naming rights, title sponsorships, hospitality programs, and Omni Sports, a proprietary sponsorship measurement and analytics platform.
Often Quoted and contributor to the Wall street Journal, NY Times, Sports Business Journal, Variety, AdAge, Adweek, CNBC, CNN
Two time winner of the Sports Business Journal 40 under 40. Recognized by the Sports Business Journal as one of the 50 most influential people in Sports; 2007/#43, 2008/#40.听
Matt Nicholson
Matt Nicholson is a fourth-year PhD student in the Department of Information Science at the 抖阴传媒在线. His research focuses on how people quantify the intangible, especially in high-level sports contexts. Matt has spent parts of six seasons working in sports analytics across both college football and professional baseball, and he worked in financial services prior to his time at CU. He also holds an MS in Information Science from CU 抖阴传媒在线, and a BS in Computer Science and Mathematical Methods in the Social Sciences from Northwestern University. In his free time, Matt enjoys watching the television show Survivor and hosting dinner parties where the meal centers around a bad pun.
Neal Scarbrough
Neal Scarbrough (Jour 鈥84) is a media executive and operations lead with a long history of management, innovation, inclusion and results in broadcast (Radio/TV), digital, print and streaming content. Primarily via sports and news media, he has delivered a diversity of revenue-generating franchises across multiple platforms. Neal currently serves as VP / GM at Marketplace, the iconic public radio business franchise. He oversees content and business operations across radio, digital and podcasting. Before Marketplace, Scarbrough served as Vice President and Executive Editor for FOX Sports, where he was charged with keeping the network鈥檚 talent and daily programming relevant, provocative, authoritative and inbounds. He also directed broadcast operations for the New England Sports Network, where he oversaw the automation of two studios and control rooms. An unmatched content strategist, Neal鈥檚 career has afforded him opportunities to be a newsroom leader, executive producer, operations chief and digital general manager. His shelf includes a Pulitzer Prize for his role in covering the Columbine tragedy and the Online Journalism Award for General Excellence earned by ESPN.com when he was its editor-in-chief.听听
Casey Schwab
As President and Founding Partner of Pathway Sports & Entertainment, Casey Schwab is an entrepreneur, operator, and lawyer whose career has spanned across sports media, the NFL, and college athletics. He has managed P&Ls and led transformative deals while leading diverse teams in the areas of media rights, sponsorship, licensing, labor negotiations, sports betting, talent, and risk management.
Before Pathway, he was the founder and CEO of Altius Sports Partners, a leading strategic advisor to blue-chip university athletic programs and corporate brands, which was fully acquired by private equity firm NewSpring Capital in 2023. Prior to founding Altius, Casey was the Vice President of Business & Legal Affairs at the NFL Players Association, leading the extension of deals with Fanatics and Electronic Arts, the creation/launch of OneTeam Partners with RedBird Capital, and the commercial portion of the current CBA between the NFLPA and the NFL. He began his career after law school at NFL Media and FOX Sports, negotiating media rights and on-air talent deals.
Casey was named to the Sports Business Journal's Forty Under 40 award (2021), The Athletic's 鈥淐ollege Basketball 20 for the Next 20鈥 list of industry leaders (2023), and the Seattle Times' "Top 25 Most Influential People in College Football" (2025). He has also taught at both USC and Howard Law School as an adjunct professor. A graduate of the University of Wisconsin and USC Gould School of Law, he now lives in Wisconsin with his wife Emilie, son Max and daughter Becca.
Ricardo Perez-Selsky
Ricardo Perez-Selsky is the Sr. Director of Digital Production Operations at Fox Sports, where he leads the network鈥檚 digital studios, remote workflows, and next-generation production technology. He oversees end-to-end operations for live shows, vertical-video programming, and major event coverage鈥攊ncluding the FIFA Women鈥檚 World Cup, MLB Postseason, and the Super Bowl鈥攕upporting thousands of digital content pieces each year. Ricardo conceived and led the development of Stage D, Fox Sports Digital鈥檚 fully automated control room environment, and drove its expansion to Charlotte, enabling a scalable, distributed production model. He has championed the integration of automation, robotic camera systems, remote podcast studios, and AI-assisted tools that enhance screening, metadata, editorial, and post workflows. With a background spanning studio operations, esports broadcasts, and multi-platform content creation, Ricardo combines creative problem-solving with operational expertise, pushing forward future-facing innovations that shape how emerging technology and AI transform modern sports media production.
Steve Smith
In his role as President of KSE Media Ventures, Steve Smith leads a diverse portfolio that includes Altitude TV, Broadcast Engineering and Broadcast Services for Ball Arena and DICK鈥橲 Sporting Goods Park, KSE Radio Ventures, SkyCam LLC, and the Outdoor Sportsman Group LLC.
Bringing more than 25 years of experience in the media industry, Steve has held senior leadership positions at major organizations such as Viacom/Paramount (Showtime Networks). During his more than 12 years with Kroenke Sports & Entertainment (KSE), he has overseen daily media operations and content strategy.
Bennet Spector
Bennett Spector, a University of Colorado alumnus, is the Executive Vice President and General Manager of听 (B/R), overseeing the company's operations across its SF, ATL, NYC, and LDN offices. Over his 15+ year career with B/R, Bennett has led the business through multiple mergers and acquisitions, partnerships with the NFL, NBA, MLB, NHL, and more. His journey from intern to GM exemplifies the dynamic career paths available in today's sports media landscape.听
Dakota Timmons
Dakota Timmons is a broadcast engineer with Mobile TV Group (MTVG), supporting live sports broadcasts across the country. He works on remote production workflows and mobile units, helping keep high-profile events on the air. With a strong background in traditional production systems, he鈥檚 now helping build modern remote production models through real-world problem solving.
Dave Zur
Dave Zur is a seasoned operations and engineering leader who focuses on the intersection of strategy and execution. As SVP of Operations & Engineering, and GM of the KSE Network Operation Center, Dave鈥檚 mission is to build strong teams, simplify complex systems, and deliver outcomes that meet the needs of the organization.. Dave is passionate about leadership development, operational rigor, and turning big ideas into real-world results. He lives in Littleton and works in Centennial, Colorado.
