Mary Stephanie Sparks, known as Stephanie Sparks, was a professional golfer and television personality who primarily worked for the Golf Channel, hosting the likes of the reality show The Big Break.
She was an All-America golfer at Duke University in North Carolina from 1992 until 1994. As specified at the archived LPGA Futures Tour official site, during her amateur career, she won the 1993 Women’s Western Amateur tournament, a Women’s Eastern Amateur championship, a West Virginia State Amateur championship, and, perhaps most prestigiously, the 1992 North and South Women’s Amateur championship at the famous Pinehurst Resort.
After graduating from Duke in 1996, she joined the LPGA’s developmental tour, the Futures Tour, and received her LPGA card in a playoff at Q-School in 1999. 2000 was her only season as an LPGA player, as back surgery forced her into retirement at the season’s climax.
Her career at the Golf Channel began in 2004 as a production assistant. That same year, she first appeared on screen in a minor role in the biographical sports drama Bobby Jones: A Stroke of Genius as Alexa Stirling, an American-Canadian golfer who won the U.S. Women’s Amateur golf championship three times and the Canadian Women’s Amateur title twice. She soon established herself there, and the rest, as they say, is history.
Sadly, on April 13, 2024, she passed away. She was just 50 years old.
How did Stephanie Sparks die?
While no cause of death for Stephanie Sparks was officially publicly disclosed, it’s believed that, tragically, she passed away due to breast cancer.
Her online obituary seems to support that notion: “The last several years of her life, Stephanie spent her time being an advocate for hospice care. She supported Libby’s Legacy Breast Cancer Foundation and the Barber Fund in Orlando.”
Moreover, a Reddit post on the r/television group has multiple commenters suggesting breast cancer was the cause.
May Stephanie Sparks rest in peace.