Who’s leaving WSVN-Ch. 7, who’s the new morning anchor and who’s replacing sportscaster Steve Shapiro?
There are going to be two new faces joining Fox affiliate WSVN-Ch. 7 1/4 u2032s news team in December.
It was announced this week that Josh Moser will take over the lead sports anchor position from veteran sportscaster Steve Shapiro, who — after 20 years — is retiring from Channel 7 News.
Also, Vanessa Borge will replace longtime anchor Christine Cruz as a co-anchor on WSVN’s morning news broadcast “Today in Florida.” After 24 years, Cruz is moving to Kentucky to join her husband, a football coach at the University of Louisville.
“We usually don’t have to fill two very big positions like this,” says Alice Jacobs, the vice president of news and local programming for WSVN. “I have not encountered this before. People tend to stay here because it’s a good place to work.”
Some South Floridians may remember Borge from her nine-year stint at WFOR-Ch. 4. Most recently the Miami native was a co-anchor on “Good Day LA” at KTTV Fox 11 in Los Angeles.
“The minute I met her she is just a bundle of warmth and energy,” recalls Jacobs. “She was just fun to be around, even for the interview process. I love that she grew up in South Florida.”
It turns out that Borge and Alex de Armas, one of the “Today in Florida” anchors, attended high school together at Our Lady of Lourdes Academy.
“She grew up here,” Jacobs says. “She knows what is important in South Florida. Its going to be pretty seamless.”
As for Moser, Jacobs said it was tricky finding someone to replace longtime sportscaster Shapiro, who delayed his retirement to get the television station through the Super Bowl.
“I literally, this is no exaggeration, I looked at 174 reels,” she says. “That’s a true number.”
What she was looking for was the same personality and innovation Shapiro brought to sports coverage.
“I really look [for someone to have] some creativity in sports. To bring a creative, fresh approach to sports. I really felt Josh had that creativity. He made his sportscast interesting. His love of sports really comes through.”
Moser will lead the sports team, which includes weekend sports anchor Mike DiPasquale and sports reporter Donovan Campbell. He will also host the weekly sports highlight show “Sports Extra” with agent Drew Rosenhaus.
Moser is a native of Southern California. He previously worked in Green Bay, Wisconsin, as sports director at WLUK (Fox 11), and in Grand Junction, Colorado, at KREK (CBS) as well as a sports reporter in Denver at KUSA (NBC).
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