Home

10%

From CSUB to ESPN

Alumna Celia Bouza oversees company’s digital video content

By California State University, Bakersfield

January 24^th, 2025

Growing up, Celia Bouza hoped she might one day work in sports. She was able to make that dream a reality, but not in the way she originally imagined.

Bouza has been a big sports fan ever since she was a child. Both of her parents played collegiate sports and encouraged her and her brother to get involved. She was also raised on a steady diet of sports programming on ESPN and other platforms.

“I spent a lot of time watching games with my parents as a kid,” she said. “Sports was always a huge part of my life. It’s truly in my DNA.”

When the time came to consider what she wanted to pursue in college, Bouza wasn’t sure what she wanted to do, other than she wanted to be involved in sports in some way. At California State University, Bakersfield, she changed her major multiple times before finally landing on communications.

Bouza said she wanted to find a way to remain involved in the sports world and decided she could do so as a journalist. She covered school sports for the student newspaper The Runner and served as the sports editor during her time there.

“That was where I found the most joy — staying connected to sports through communications,” she said.

Bouza graduated with her communications degree in 2010, joining her parents, who are also CSUB graduates. While she ultimately decided against pursuing a career in journalism, she has remained connected to sports through her 14-year career at the ESPN headquarters in Bristol, Connecticut.

Bouza is currently the vice president of multi-platform video, a role she has held since August. She oversees all digital video-on-demand content, whether that be on ESPN’s website, apps, YouTube or social media accounts. She is responsible for a team of nearly 50 employees.

“I’m so humbled and thrilled to be leading such a critical part of our business, and it truly is the future of our business,” Bouza said. “Sports fandom has changed. The digital side is where a lot of our younger fans are experiencing ESPN. It’s really important for us to find fans where they are and figure out the best way to serve them.”

While Bouza had planned to have a career as a writer, she’s happy about where she’s ended up.

“Not everybody gets to make their job or their career out of something that they grew up loving to do, but I’ve been so fortunate,” she said. “It’s unreal, to be honest. I still pinch myself sometimes when I walk through the halls here. It was — and still is — the dream job for me.”

Third time's the charm

Bouza’s journey to ESPN was a winding one with a few false starts. As she approached graduation from CSUB, her goal was to work as a writer for a newspaper, preferably covering sports, but she quickly found that the job outlook wasn’t ideal.

“It was a time when a lot of newspapers were closing and there was not a lot of jobs available,” she said.

After a classmate suggested trying broadcast news, Bouza reached out to one of the local news channels, KBAK, and was able to secure a summer internship there as a production assistant. After the internship ended, she was hired to cover local high school football games.

“They really set me on my path to do television and covering sports that way,” she said. “At the time, I still wasn’t convinced that this was exactly what my path was going to be. I still missed writing. I said to myself that in order for me to continue down the producing path, I’d have to go to ESPN. If you want to work in sports television, that is the best place to do it in the business.”

Bouza brought this up to one of her mentors at CSUB, now-retired Associate Professor of Communications Judith Pratt, who found an internship at ESPN being offered through the Association of Women in Sports Media and urged her to apply.

“I knew she really wanted to learn,” Pratt said. “She threw herself into her schoolwork and became very skilled. She thrives under pressure and likes having competition.”

Bouza applied for the internship the December before her final semester at CSUB but didn’t end up getting it. The day after being notified, however, she received an email from an ESPN employee who asked if Bouza wanted to interview for a full-time production assistant position, to which she quickly agreed. The interview did not go as well as Bouza had hoped.

“I completely bombed the interview,” she said. “They were asking me about sports I didn’t watch or cover. I didn’t realize the depth of knowledge that would be required. I knew I had to figure out how to be better next time, if there was a next time.”

That next time came three months later. While walking to a class at CSUB, Bouza received a phone call from the ESPN headquarters offering her a production assistant job.

“I accepted it on the spot. It really felt like this was my opportunity to strike out on my own, to leave my hometown,” she said. “I got on a red-eye flight the same day I walked in my graduation. I started two weeks later and moved across the country hoping for the best. Fourteen years later, I’m still here.”

Bouza joined ESPN on a seven-month trial period as part of its production assistant trainee program. She produced a wide range of content, from “SportsCenter” highlights to teases for “Sunday NFL Countdown.”

“Being at ESPN exceeded my expectations,” she said. “I missed home a lot, but it was fun.”

Bouza was hired to stay on in the role after her probation was up, spending a total of two years as a production assistant before moving up to being an associate producer.

After over four years with the company, Bouza felt she had reached a point when she needed to decide what kind of future career she wanted to have at ESPN.

“I was at a career crossroads,” she said. “It was important for me to decide if wanted to go the executive route or continue to produce for the rest of my career.”

Bouza decided to apply to be the manager of production enhancements and got the job. She oversaw the research and development of new techniques aimed at improving ESPN’s content and storytelling. After doing that for about three years, she became an associate supervisor of motion graphics, managing ESPN’s motion graphics projects and overseeing a group of seven graphic designers.

“I had never managed anyone before that time and didn’t have any graphics experience, so I had to get up to speed with how the company creates all the graphics for our live and taped programming,” she said. “I knew all these roles I had would get me closer to my end goal, which was to be an executive.”

'The most fulfilling job'

The next big junction in Bouza’s career came in 2019, she was hired to lead the very trainee program she was part of when she first came to ESPN, now rebranded as ESPN NEXT. As director of the program, she was responsible for the strategy and planning for more than 250 employees.

As if having a new job wasn’t a big enough change, it was also a turbulent time in Bouza’s personal life. She had just had a child and her mother died from cancer shortly after she started work as director of the program.

“It was a lot of change at one time. I thought ‘this is too much right now,’” she said.

Over time, Bouza was able to adjust to her new position and found that she really enjoyed it.

“It was the most fulfilling job that I had because where my passion lies is in coaching, helping people start their careers, creating opportunities for them to thrive,” she said. “To be able to do that and jumpstart people’s careers was great. I knew what the program did for me when I started.”

The job didn’t come without significant challenges. COVID-19 hit after Bouza had spent less than a year in the position, and suddenly she found herself having to manage a crisis.

“Trying to navigate how we were going to keep everyone busy, as well as trying to come up with ways to keep them engaged during that time and quell fear of being in the building – it was very hard and constantly changing,” Bouza said. “I think I worked 40 or 50 days straight just trying to navigate the changing information and COVID protocols. It was probably one of the hardest things I’ve ever had to lead through. I think that was a really formative time for me to flex my leadership style.”

Bouza spent five years with ESPN NEXT and held several positions, the last of which was as vice president of both ESPN NEXT and the company’s social production. By that point, she had over 300 employees working under her. Then came her current role as vice president of multi-platform video.

“It gave me an opportunity to get back to into content production, which is where my heart really is and where I started my career,” she said. “While I don’t sit in front of an edit machine anymore and I’m not pulling plays, I still have input on what I believe works, what I believe could be reiterated or what I believe can put us in the best position to continue to lead in the space. We are constantly testing and trying new things. We try to make the most engaging content possible based on what feedback we’re getting back from users.”

Bouza said she really enjoys being in a position where she can once again focus on creativity and storytelling at ESPN.

“That's what we do really well, and so to have the opportunity to lead a content team that is so critical to the future of our business is so exciting for me,” she said. “I have to put on a different hat because it is completely different than people-focused development work.”

'Proud to be from CSUB'

Pratt, who has kept in contact with Bouza since her graduation in 2010, said she’s proud of how far her former student has come.

“She’s really made a name for herself at ESPN. She seems to be doing the most creative things she can do there, doing what she loved best,” she said. “It’s a great success story for Cal State Bakersfield to have this young woman on the national stage. She was following her dreams and she got it. We wish that level of success for all of our students.”

Bouza said she wouldn’t be where she is today without the experience she had at CSUB. She credits the support of her professors for helping her reach graduation.

“These folks helped me focus and hone my skills to be able to thrive once I left,” she said. “I knew my professors. They weren’t just a name, and I wasn’t just a name to them, and I think that’s really the bottom line.”

Bouza believes the education and experience students get from CSUB can be just as valuable as those from larger schools.

“I tell anyone who will listen that you don’t have to go to a big school to be impactful in this industry,” she said. “The education and the support and the community you get from Cal State Bakersfield is not only enough, but it’s extraordinary, and it’s helped me achieve the things that I've done so far. You’re not going to get the same level of attention at a large school as you do at CSUB. I think that was what was critical for me. I’m so proud to be from Bakersfield, so proud to be from CSUB.”

Bouza said she would like to see fellow CSUB alumni come to work at ESPN and that she is interested in helping them get their career started. She urges alumni to reach out to her for support.

As for the future of her own career, Bouza is happy with where she’s at for the time being.

“I want to continue to tackle whatever’s in front of me, continue to be an innovative thinker and coach, someone who is a great people-leader at the end of the day. That’s what I want my legacy to be,” she said. “As someone who grew up on ESPN, it’s been amazing for me to be able to contribute to this legacy brand, and I feel so privileged to help continue to usher that into the future.”