Carrie Underwood dated a former Dallas Cowboys star for a year.

Country music artist Carrie Underwood performs at a concert

Country music artist Carrie Underwood performs at a concert

© GABY VELASQUEZ/ EL PASO TIMES / USA TODAY NETWORK

Carrie Underwood has become one of the most popular country singers in history during her 20 years in the music industry. She rose to fame after winning the fourth season of “American Idol” in 2005, jumpstarting her eight-time Grammy Award–winning career. But over the last 12 years, Underwood has also been well known as the voice of the NFL’s “Sunday Night Football.”

From 1987 to 2005, ESPN held the rights to “Sunday Night Football” before NBC took over for the 2006 NFL season. On NBC, Pink originally wrote and performed SNF’s theme song, “Waiting All Day for Sunday Night,” a reworked version of Joan Jett’s “I Hate Myself for Loving You.” Faith Hill replaced Pink in 2007, and Underwood took over the role in 2013.

Country singer Carrie Underwood

The theme song has been played before every Sunday night game, and that will be no different when Matthew Stafford and the Los Angeles Rams host Baker Mayfield and the Tampa Bay Buccaneers in Week 12 of the 2025 NFL season. But before she was the voice of “SNF,” Underwood dated a popular NFL quarterback.

Beginning in late 2006, Underwood dated former Dallas Cowboys quarterback and current CBS Sports analyst Tony Romo, the same year he replaced Drew Bledsoe as the team’s starter. But the relationship was short-lived, as Underwood and Romo split the following year.

Their last public appearance together came on the red carpet at the 2007 Academy of Country Music Awards, where Underwood won three awards, including Top Female Vocalist of the Year. And when asked if she would ever write a song about Romo, Underwood hinted that they didn’t end on the best of terms.

“No,” Underwood said in a 2009 interview with Esquire. “I would never immortalize a guy that did me wrong. I would never give him that much credit.”

Underwood went on to marry former NHL player Mike Fisher in 2010, and the two have been together since, raising their two sons, Isaiah and Jacob. Meanwhile, Romo continued dating high-profile figures, including a brief relationship with Jessica Simpson, before marrying actress and model Candice Crawford in 2011.