Hoda Kotb fills in for Savannah Guthrie on ‘Today’ amid Nancy Guthrie search

Hoda Kotb is filling at the “Today” show co-host Savannah Guthrie amid the desperate search for the latter’s elderly mother, Nancy, who authorities believe was abducted.

The 84-year-old matriarch was last seen Saturday at her Tucson, Ariz. home after dinner with daughter Annie. Loved ones were alerted to something amiss when she failed to show up to church the next morning.

Kotb, 61, who departed the NBC morning show just over a year ago, narrated a segment about the search Friday morning.

“I think there’s like this helpless feeling. We’re all so close to her and we want to help her. And like, I’m looking at us, and I’m thinking, who was first in the hospital room when Hope was sick? Savannah,” Kotb recalled of her 6-year-old daughter’s medical crisis in 2023.

She went around the table to Carson Daly, Sheinelle Jones, and Craig Melvin, recalling how Guthrie, 54, has been a stabilizing force in all their lives.

She was the “first person” to fly to Daly when his parents died, she sat with Jones’ now-late husband Uche as he was sick, and was there for Melvin when his brother died.

“They say, ‘Love is patient, like, love is kind,’ we’ll be patient and put prayers up,” said Kotb.

Melvin concurred that, though they feel helpless, “We’re not helpless because it’s prayer, it’s hope. Prayer and hope.”

Kotb announced in September 2024 that, following her 60th birthday, she’d decided to exit her post at “Today,” in part to prioritize daughters Hope and Haley, now 9. Kotb, who counted Guthrie as her “rock,” left in January 2025.

Former pro tennis player Mary Carillo has been tapped as Guthrie’s replacement to cover the Winter Olympics Opening Ceremony Friday from Milan.

In a heartbreaking video Thursday, Guthrie and her siblings pleaded for their mother’s safe return, as they reminded her potential captor that Nancy is adored and physically frail.