March is the most exciting month of the year in men’s college basketball, with conference tournaments and the NCAA Tournaments drawing interest from coast to coast.
This year, five Penn State College of Communications students, all journalism majors, will play important roles amidst that madness. Seniors Phil Constantino, Mike Esse and Mike Wargon and junior Jeff Jezewski will serve as production assistants for Westwood One in its New York City studio for “Conference Championship Week” and the NCAA Tournament.
Additionally, senior Meghan Caffrey will work as a sideline assistant for Fox Sports during the Big East basketball Tournament in Madison Square Garden, also in New York City, this week.
Caffrey’s duties run from March 11-14. As a sideline assistant, she will be working behind the scenes doing prep work and shadowing the sideline reporter during games, learning from her and assisting with interviews.
Caffrey has been working with Fox Sports for two years, spending time as a summer intern and working in the same role last year. Fox Sports 1 is broadcasting all nine games of the Big East Tournament.
“I’m extremely excited to work this event,” said Caffrey. “Every opportunity I have with Fox Sports is always great and it’s fun to see the same faces. Penn State helped prepare me for Fox Sports because it prepares you on how to hold yourself professionally. We take classes that put us in real-life roles where the outcome is sometimes unknown and we learn on the spot how to deal with those types of events and I think that is one of the most useful things to learn.”
Constantino, Esse, Jezewski and Wargon will be working for Westwood One, the radio home of the most postseason college basketball. From studios in the CBS Broadcast Center, they will be cutting game highlights.
“We sit there, listen to the game and track the big plays so that we can go back and find them easily. We cut highlights as the game goes so they can use them at halftime, postgame or even throughout the game if they have to,” said Constantino.
According to Constantino, assistants are assigned regions when it comes to the NCAA Tournament, listening to every game from their region and cutting highlights from those games. That way, there is no overlap and they only have to pay attention to one game at a time.
The key, Constantino said, is to listen to important plays and then cut them out, following strict guidelines as far as length and naming the files.
Despite being an assistant, there is a level of professionalism and perfection expected from all of the students. Working on a nationally broadcast event leaves little room for error.
“You’re treated as a professional,” said Constantino. “You’re another guy who is expected to do his job and do it right. There is no leniency for being an intern. You’re being paid to do it. It’s the big leagues.”
Even though the days will be busy with little or no time to take a break, Constantino enjoys the event, which he and Esse each worked last year. Jezewski and Wargon will be working the event for the first time. They completed internships with Westwood One last summer.
“We were in studio for many national broadcasts over the summer, but we will have a bigger role this time around and college basketball has a bigger audience than some of the other games we worked,” said Jezewski, who is helping with conference tournament broadcasts on March 13.
Having worked during March Madness for Westwood One last year, Constantino is more prepared for what is to come and knows what to expect so he can hit the ground running this year.
“It’s rather hectic, but it’s fun,” said Constantino. “You feel important because you’re contributing to something that is big time. You’re paying me to show up and watch and listen to and work around games that I’m going to watch and listen to all day anyway.”
Westwood One, the leading multi-platform provider of sports, music, news, spoken word and digital audio content, has an ongoing connection to Penn State. Constantino said Westwood One and Larry Costigan, a producer at the company who hires the interns, are fond of Penn Staters.
“He has become very fond of the program that has run out of here and very fond of the College of Communications,” said Constantino. “The Penn State brand is well respected here.”
Constantino and the students take pride in the opportunity they’ve earned.
“Penn State has taught me nothing is too big for you. Every year in March, I go work for a major national broadcast. Outside of TV, it’s biggest thing in sports,” Constantino said. “It’s something you learn being in the culture here.”