Todd Blackledge

Todd Blackledge, who has been on the call of many of college football’s biggest games over the past three decades, joined NBC Sports in 2023 as the analyst on Big Ten Saturday Night – the primetime Big Ten Football game which will air each week on NBC and stream live on Peacock.

Blackledge, who quarterbacked Penn State to the national championship in 1982, begins his 30^th season as a network college football analyst after spending the 1994-2022 seasons in the booth for ABC, CBS and, most recently, ESPN. In addition, he has called a College Football Playoff semifinal in each of the past nine seasons – including TCU’s thrilling 51-45 victory over Michigan in the Fiesta Bowl in December 2022 – and served as ESPN Radio’s analyst for 11 of the last 12 college football championship games.

Blackledge began his broadcast career as a sports-talk radio host in Ohio, while also providing analysis for Cleveland Browns, Indianapolis Colts, and Philadelphia Eagles preseason broadcasts and the Big East Network. He also worked on the Emmy Award-winning Penn State Football Story.

Blackledge was selected seventh overall in the famed 1983 NFL Draft, and played seven NFL seasons (Kansas City 1983-87; Pittsburgh 1988-89).

In 1994, he joined ABC Sports as a college football analyst, before being named CBS’ lead analyst in 1999. In 2006, he became the analyst for ESPN’s Saturday primetime college football series. Also at ESPN he provided analysis on ESPN College Football Primetime and was a regular contributor to College GameDay, SportsCenter, and ESPN Radio.

In 2007, he created “Todd’s Taste of the Town” segments which for a decade were part of the Saturday game telecasts, and featured Blackledge visiting classic local eateries in college towns. His companion book Taste of the Town: A Guided Tour of College Football’s Best Places to Eat was published in 2013.

Blackledge was 31-5 as a three-year starter for Penn State (1980-82), earning Sugar Bowl Most Outstanding Player honors as he led the Nittany Lions to the 1982 national championship with a victory over Georgia. Following his 1982 senior season, he earned the Davey O’Brien Award as the nation’s top quarterback and finished sixth in Heisman Trophy voting.

In 2009, he was awarded Penn State’s Distinguished Alumni Award. He is a member of Penn State’s Board of Visitors for Penn State’s Center for Sports Journalism. A year earlier, Blackledge and seven fellow NFL alumni visited U.S. troops in the Middle East, where he coached in the USO’s flag football tournament, Operation Gridiron: Huddle with the Troops.

Blackledge, the proud father of four sons, lives in Charlotte with his wife, Brittany.

Blackledge received a Bachelor of Arts degree in speech communication from Penn State in 1983, graduating Phi Beta Kappa. A first-team Academic All-American, he also earned the Eric Walker Award that year from Penn State, given annually to the senior believed to have most “enhanced the esteem and recognition of the University.”