ESPN Anchor Stuart Scott Has Died at 49

ESPN anchor Stuart Scott has passed away at age 49 following a long battle with cancer, ESPN announced on Sunday morning.

Serving the sports network for 20 years, Scott was best known for his catchy slogans like "Boo-yah," "Call him butter; he's on a roll," and "Cooler than the other side of the pillow."

ESPN honored Scott with the Jimmy V Perseverence Award at the 2014 ESPYs, at which he vulnerably shared his cancer experiences with viewers.

He is survived by his daughters, Taelor and Sydni.

Stuart Scott was born July 19, 1965. Scott had two sisters (Susan and Synthia) and one brother, Stephen. He attended Mount Tabor High School for 9th and 10th grade and then completed his last two years at Richard J. Reynolds High School in Winston-Salem, North Carolina. He attended the University of North Carolina. He was a member of Alpha Phi Alpha fraternity, and was part of the on-air talent at the student-run radio station WXYC. He graduated from the University of North Carolina in 1987 with a Bachelor of Arts in speech communication. Following graduation, Scott worked as a reporter at WPDE-TV in Florence, South Carolina, from 1988-1990 and at WRAL-TV 5 in Raleigh, North Carolina, from 1990-1993. He worked at WESH, an NBC affiliate in Orlando, Florida, from 1993-1995.

Scott joined ESPN2 at the network's launch in 1993 as the host of SportsNight. He worked for ESPN as an anchor for SportsCenter episodes as well as National Football League and National Basketball Association programming. Scott appeared in each issue of ESPN the Magazine, with his 'Holla' column. In his work at ESPN, he interviewed top professional athletes such as Tiger Woods and Michael Jordan, as well as two American Presidents: then-Senator Barack Obama and Bill Clinton.

At SportsCenter Scott was frequently teamed with fellow anchor Rich Eisen. He became well known for his use of unique catch phrases, following in the SportsCenter tradition begun by Dan Patrick and Keith Olbermann, such as "holla at a playa when you see him in the street!", "call him butter, he's on a roll" and "Boo Yah!" and "as cool as the other side of the pillow." In 1999 he was parodied on SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE by Tim Meadows.

Besides SportsCenter, Scott was the host of a number of television shows. His NFL work included NFL Matchup, NFL Live, NFL PrimeTime, and NFL Countdown, while his NBA work included hosting the NBA FINALS and NBA Fastbreak. He hosted a number of ESPN game and reality shows, including Stump the Schwab, Teammates, and Dream Job, and hosted David Blaine's Drowned Alive special. He hosted a special and only broadcast episode of America's Funniest Home Videos called AFV: The Sports Edition.

Scott was married to Kimberly Scott from 1993 to 2007. They had two daughters together, Taelor and Sydni. Scott lived in Avon, Connecticut. At the time of his death, Scott was in a relationship with Kristin Spodobalski.

Scott was injured when hit in the face by a football during a New York Jets mini-camp on April 3, 2002, while filming a special for ESPN, a blow which DAMAGED his cornea. He received surgery but since suffered from ptosis, or drooping of the eyelid.

Scott had an emergency appendectomy in Pittsburgh after becoming ill while covering the Pittsburgh Steelers-Miami Dolphins MONDAY NIGHT FOOTBALL game on November 26, 2007. The surgeons discovered a malignancy that required an additional surgery to remove possibly cancerous tissue. He returned a month later and continued on-air broadcasting during recommended preventive chemotherapy. ESPN President George Bodenheimer said "Stuart is approaching this fight with the same passion and energy we see on air ... He knows he has our full support and we look forward to the day where this is all behind him."

The cancer returned in 2010. Scott went into remission in early 2012, but he was again diagnosed with cancer on January 14, 2013.

Scott was honored at the ESPYS on July 16, 2014, with the Jimmy V Award for his ongoing fight against cancer. He shared that he had four surgeries in seven days in the week prior to his appearance, when he was suffering from liver complications and kidney failure. Stuart died the morning of January 4, 2015.

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