This week, the Marist Center for Sports Communication sent five other students and me to cover Super Bowl Media Week in San Francisco, CA, in anticipation of Sunday’s Super Bowl LX matchup between the Seattle Seahawks and New England Patriots. This is the second of multiple entries documenting our journey in Northern California, covering the lead-up to America’s biggest sporting event.
SAN FRANCISCO, Calif – My alarm rang at 5:30 a.m.
“It’s 8:30 back home,” I whispered to myself, doing my best to mentally stay on the Eastern time zone to distract myself from the five or so hours of sleep I just got.
Monday was grueling, thrilling, draining and exhilarating — pretty much any adjective you could think of.
Our day started on Radio Row in San Francisco and ended at the conclusion of Super Bowl Opening Night. In between were too many interviews to count, and a ton of valuable interactions with professionals and fellow students alike.
On a more personal note, Tuesday meant more to me than any other day on the calendar. Feb. 3 marked the 18th anniversary of Super Bowl XLII, where the New York Giants upset the undefeated New England Patriots. Though I have no conscious memory of watching that fateful night 18 years ago, it became my hyper fixation.
For the next few years, there was only one DVD I slid into my family’s disc tray: NFL Super Bowl XLII – New York Giants Championship. I had memorized nearly the entire 2-hour, 55-minute documentary over the following years. There, I found my love of football and sports as a whole.
I walked to the Moscone Center as the sun rose and grabbed some breakfast on the third floor; Jaylen Rizzo finished organizing her photo gallery from Opening Night, while I put the finishing touches on my Jason Myers story. The six of us then got back on a shuttle, this one to Santa Clara for the Patriots media availability outside their team hotel.
In a massive tent stationed in the parking lot, a curtain divided the main stage from 10 other smaller podiums. Patriots head coach Mike Vrabel took the stage at 11:00 a.m.
“You don’t have to raise your hand, Karen, I know where you’re at,” he said.
Vrabel always lets Karen Guregian, a columnist for MassLive, ask the first question every time he is open for media availability. That tradition has continued throughout the playoffs, and even yesterday at Opening Night.
Unlike the chaos of his last appearance in front of the media, there was some order this time around; it was a regular, run-of-the-mill press conference. He answered questions for 15 minutes, then the reporters dispersed to the 10 podiums on the other side of the curtain, for more free-for-all questions.
Off to the side, watching the scrums unfold was a familiar face: J.A. Adande.
Adande has spent time as a reporter for the Los Angeles Times, Chicago Sun-Times and Washington Post, and wrote for ESPN as an NBA analyst starting in 2007. I knew him more from Around the Horn, an ESPN roundtable discussion television show.
When the show was cancelled in May of 2025, it had totaled nearly 5,000 episodes in almost 23 years on air. It’d be impossible to know how many of those I watched, but I can assure you it was a lot.
He wore a black Northwestern University quarter-zip jacket and wandered with his hands held behind his back, and looked on with a proud smile. Now the director of the sports journalism program at Northwestern, he was here at media week as advisor for the 14 students his program sent to the Bay Area.
Adande could hardly remember how many Super Bowls he had covered; he’d done this song and dance too many times to recall.
“I have no more questions to ask,” he calmly said as he peered out into media mayhem before him.
We returned to San Francisco and filmed a video with Andrew Marchand, a senior sports media writer for The Athletic.
William Rosen and I did the interview with him for separate personal reasons. William loves all things sports media, including broadcast news, and the ongoing battle for viewership/subscribership for regional sports networks. Me? Marchand and I are from the same town in Connecticut; I graduated from Trumbull High School in 2022 with his oldest daughter.
The interview was a perfect segue into our next stop. Five minutes after we finished with Marchand, NBC opened its cast of star-studded names up to the media on the second floor of the Moscone Center. Tony Dungy, Devin McCourty, Jac Collinsworth, Chris Simms and Jason Garrett all sat at tables scattered throughout the room, casually speaking to reporters
The big guns, NBC’s in-game Super Bowl LX commentators, made their way down a red carpet in the back of the room. Sideline reporters Melissa Stark and Kaylee Hartung took turns answering questions in the middle of the red carpet, while color commentator Cris Collinsworth and play-by-play man Mike Tirico did the same on either side of them.
After a long wait, William got some time to speak to Tirico.
At a brief break in action, I mobile ordered Chipotle for my first meal of the day… at 3:30 p.m. (I’m sorry, Mom). While waiting on it, I scooted across to the street to Moscone South, where the Super Bowl Experience was held. Fans in all different teams’ jerseys packed Howard Street; the experience is designed to give fans a taste of the Super Bowl, without having to take out a loan to buy tickets.
For the Super Bowl, Moscone South’s ballroom had been converted into a 30,000-square-foot NFL Shop. It almost looked like a mall, as different retail brands occupied different sections of the store. I couldn’t help myself; I had to at least take a look. I folded under the slightest bit of pressure, applied by myself. As a recovering hat-purchasing addict, I relapsed and bought a beautiful ‘47 brand felted wool hat, with a suede brim (I’m sorry, Mom, again).
Next up on the docket was the 2026 Pro Bowl Games. We didn’t exactly have the correct credentials to be there, but by the time we realized, we had already captured some great content.
The NFL gave up trying to pretend that the Pro Bowl was real football in 2023, opting to instead have its selections ditch their pads for flags instead. For years, Pro Bowlers had been opting out of the originally full-contact event in fear of injuries and elected not put their already battered bodies through another week of pain.
The switch to flag football did not result in a spike in big-name participation. Most reserves that were next in line after the original picks dropped out, too, leading to a hodgepodge of random Pro Bowl “selections.” The problem could be seen clearly on the AFC’s roster.
Of their three quarterbacks, none had started double-digit games. Joe Burrow started eight, Shedeur Sanders started seven and Joe Flacco started six. All other more deserving quarterbacks declined to participate in the Pro Bowl for personal or medical reasons.
The event was not designed to be a spectacle; this year, it was played in the convention center in front of no more than five thousand spectators. A DJ sat at the midfield mark and played music throughout the course of the game, while emcees announced the game through the center’s speakers.
On Dak Prescott’s opening drive touchdown pass to Amon-Ra St. Brown, more effort went into the celebration than what was displayed on the field.
The product on the fun-sized NFL turf field was never meant to be the focus. It’s an event for the fans, many of whom, being kids, went hysterical each time a player looked in their direction.
The players seemed to enjoy it too. Burrow caught a toss from De’Von Achane and pirouetted into the endzone before jumping and spiking the ball; he ran around the field with a boyish grin.
The Cincinnati Bengals’ season was a lost cause after Burrow went down with a turf toe injury in Week 2. By the time he returned, over two months later, the Bengals were all but eliminated from playoff contention.
With nothing to play for, Burrow still wanted to be on the field.
“We’re getting paid a lot of money to play a kid’s game. I love playing,” Burrow told Melissa Stark of NBC Sports after leading Cincinnati to a win in his first game back. “I just want to put on a show for the fans. Be out there with my guys. Go out and play well.”
By all accounts on the stat sheet, Burrow should not have been a Pro Bowler this year, but he embodies what the game is now meant for. It’s supposed to be for kids. It’s supposed to be fun.
We left after watching the first quarter, for we had a shuttle to catch… as always.
EA Sports hosted a party in Redwood City for all media members who remembered to check their email and RSVP. At the yearly Super Bowl Media Party, credentialed members of the media had the chance to unwind and catch up with former colleagues and friends across the industry.
The all-you-can-eat and all-you-can-drink aspect was enough to attract a jam-packed crowd. I didn’t abuse either element; I ate a burger and had a “Golden Gate Gimblet” and a beer.
As I stepped outside and peered out into the dark, rolling hills that surrounded Redwood City, I couldn’t help but reflect. As arrogant as it may sound, I wasn’t yet satisfied with my first few days in California. I was inspired to want more than just a week of living this life.
Don’t get me wrong, it was great introducing myself to new people. We had a ton of fun talking to fellow students from Bryant University and Arizona State University, learning about the similarities and differences in our sports media experiences.
But this week thus far, and this night specifically, made me realize: I don’t want to introduce myself to everyone I see. I want to already know them.
I want to be here. I want to stay here. I want this to be business as usual. Somewhere down the line, I want to think: “Eh, I don’t know if I want to go to the media party this year.”
That’s because I’m inspired to make this the norm. I want to be at big events like these. I want to earn it. I want to cover sports on stages large and small. One day, like Adande, I want to have no more questions to ask.
Photo by Jaylen Rizzo
To follow along with our full Super Bowl LX coverage, click here.
For coverage of Marist Athletics, follow @cfmarist on Instagram, X, TikTok and Bluesky, and sign up to receive daily alerts here.
