Marycate Walsh

Vice President, External Affairs, Monumental Sports and Entertainment

Marycate Walsh is Vice President of External Affairs at Monumental Sports & Entertainment, where she leads marquee initiatives that connect sports to lasting community value. She steered stakeholder engagement, outreach, and narrative strategy for the Capital One Arena transformation, helping secure $515 million in unanimous District-approved public financing and positioning the arena as a long-term economic anchor for downtown Washington

She designed and now oversees District of Play, an ESPN Sports Humanitarian Award–nominated youth-sports platform that has reached more than 200,000 DC residents—refurbishing neighborhood courts and rinks, delivering essential gear, and last year, putting 29,934 basketballs into the hands of every DC Public Schools student in grades Pre-K–5.

In parallel, Marycate serves as a Public Affairs Officer in the U.S. Navy Reserve, where she directs training and readiness for all Reserve public affairs officers and mass communication specialists assigned to Navy Reserve Chief of Information. She most recently served as Executive Communications Advisor to the Chief of Naval Reserve, authoring the Admiral’s testimony for both the House and Senate Appropriations Defense Subcommittees in 2025.

Before joining MSE, Marycate spent twelve years on active duty in the U.S. Navy, including service as a Pentagon spokesperson and assignments spanning crisis response and strategic communications at sea and ashore. An All-Patriot League rower at the U.S. Naval Academy, she holds a B.S. in English from the Academy and an M.A. in Defense & Strategic Studies from the Naval War College.