At Carolina, excellence and national championships aren’t just confined to the field or the court—they’re also found in the newsroom. Carolina’s Hussman School of Journalism and Media has earned six consecutive Hearst national championships for collegiate journalism, mirroring the championship pedigree often demonstrated by Tar Heel athletic programs.

It only makes sense for student-athletes with a championship pedigree to want to challenge themselves academically, navigating the rigorous demands and responsibilities that come with being a student-athlete while pursuing journalism degrees from Carolina.

One of those student athletes is women’s lacrosse defender Adair Martin, who decided in high school that she wanted to study journalism while on a backpacking trip.

“That trip really helped me decide on studying journalism because I loved adventure and the things I was doing, and I wanted to tell people about it—which was so amazing. I thought that the best way to do this was journalism,” she said. “When I was being recruited to play lacrosse, I really wanted to be at a school where I could win a national championship, but also somewhere with amazing academics. That’s why I chose Carolina.

Others, like volleyball’s Zoe Behrendt, viewed the journalism program as a way to stay involved with sports.

“From a young age, I didn’t know exactly what I wanted to do, but I knew I wanted to be involved in sports,” Behrendt said. “I was always interested in sports and loved talking about sports. I asked myself what I could do to stay involved with sports after playing volleyball. Broadcasting was something that I got into a little more by the time I got to Carolina, and that’s the track I’ve been on since starting classes at Hussman.”

REAL LIFE TRAINING

Like any student in the Hussman School of Journalism and Media, both Behrendt and Martin are taking classes for their desired degree track. Perhaps unsurprisingly, the student athletes’ favorite courses of study also involve sports in some capacity.

“My favorite two classes that I’ve taken so far are Sports Communication and Sports Marketing, both with Livis Freeman. He’s great—he’s worked with Jordan, he’s worked with NASCAR, he’s worked with ESPN and Fox Sports,” Behrendt said. “In the Sports Communication class, we worked in groups to create an awareness campaign for the Greenville Yard Gnomes—a brand new Coastal Plain League Baseball Team. At the end of the semester, we got to present our projects to the team, and my group was selected as the best pitch.”

“This spring I took his Sports Marketing class, and our client was Carolina NIL. As a student athlete, I interact with Carolina NIL all the time, and then when I went into class, I created a campaign for the client, which was cool because I get to see the best of both worlds,” she continued. “I feel like I’m at an advantage as a student-athlete and being able to have that perspective for my group.”

While her long-term aspirations are more on the writing side of journalism than the on-screen side of the camera, Martin’s favorite class is actually a sports broadcast class, held in conjunction with Carolina’s student news broadcast, Carolina Week.

“Right now, I’m in a class called Sports Xtra with Charlie Tuggle. It’s pretty much creating your own ESPN. It’s amazing,” she said. “We have full control of what we want to produce, what sports we’re covering and the direction of our storylines. We go to all the games, video, interview, research the teams, and make our own sports packages. That’s my favorite course so far because you turn into a reporter. This is a job. I think that’s why I love that course.”

Given her inside track on the program, the redshirt junior defender has covered her fair share of lacrosse for Sports Xtra, but has also covered tennis as well. As part of the course, Martin has had a few of her feature stories go to air on campus television, including pieces on teammates Betty Nelson, Alice Ripper, and the Humphrey sisters.

BOTH SIDES OF THE CAMERA

As student-athletes who are also studying journalism, both Martin and Behrendt admit that their educational pursuits are in the back of their minds while giving postgame interviews following their respective contests.

“We’ve done a lot of training and interviewing, and I’ve had so much experience with it so far that I know I now know what to say to kind of get the result that I want,” Martin said. “Not that I know exactly what a reporter is going to ask, but more of like, OK, so if I say this line, then maybe he’ll give me a response like this and now it will be perfect for my post-game interview—kind of lining up all the pieces.”

“This past fall when I would do post-game interviews, I had already taken MEJO 153, which is Writing and Reporting, which taught us how to interview from the reporter’s perspective. It’s been great to see both sides of an interview,” Behrendt added. “I’ve honestly used that to my advantage to know what I like to be asked in post-game interviews and what I would ask my coach after the game knowing what he said in the locker room or knowing what he’s saying on the court.”

However, if you were to flip the interview script and put Behrendt and Martin behind the camera to ask questions, they both were quick to give a few of their dream interview subjects.

“My first thought was Kobe Bryant, because I’ve seen a lot of interviews with him, and his mindset, along with the type of player he was, it would be so cool just to pick his brain on so many topics,” Behrendt said. “But then, my mind goes to volleyball, and I would want to go with the best of the best—Madison Skinner, who won three national championships in college. She’s the real deal. Seeing what she’s done after college has been amazing, and I would love to know about the different dynamics she’s experienced on different teams, sometimes being the oldest, and now professionally, being the youngest.”

Martin’s first choice was slightly more unconventional.

“I think Tommy Caldwell would be my dream interview,” Martin said. “He’s an insane rock climber who has done the most incredible peaks and has all these crazy stories. For a more traditional sport, I think interviewing Simone Biles—or any other top female athletes—would be amazing.”

FUTURE ASIPIRATIONS

When their time at Carolina comes to a close, both Behrendt and Martin have their sights set on careers in journalism—on different ends of the media.

For Martin, who counts professional mountain athlete and author Jimmy Chen as one of her career inspirations, a career covering extreme sports or adventure journalism—with a focus more on writing than video.

“The type of journalism that I want to go into is adventure journalism, with more of a focus on extreme sports like skiing, biking, and surfing. Jimmy Chen has done more of the National Geographic-type journalism, but I always follow him with what he’s working on and doing—that’s the direction I want to go after,” she said.

“A dream career for me would be working for the X Games. I love everything about them,” she continued. “I’ve watched both the summer and winter games ever since I was younger—I’ve always been a bigger fan of the winter games, but recently, I’ve been getting more into the summer sports like surfing.”

After spending some time with GoHeels Productions, Behrendt’s long term goals have her sights set on the sidelines and being in front of the camera.

“I grew up watching football and my goal would be to eventually make it into maybe the NFL or MLB, one of the national leagues as a sideline reporter,” she said. “I’d love to get my foot in the door in broadcasting, maybe in volleyball, because that’s where a lot of my knowledge lies, and getting the experience and working my way up to a sideline reporter or analyst would be the ultimate goal.”

If the sideline reporter role doesn’t work out, Behrendt has additional aspirations in taking after one of her broadcast inspirations, Erin Andrews, and starting a podcast focused on women’s sports.

“I think we need more podcasts on the women’s side of sports, and specifically volleyball because it’s gaining popularity,” she said. “I’ve always thought that maybe I could be the one to start that podcast. I know a lot of people in the volleyball world, and I’ve even talked with my coaches about my journalism aspirations, and they suggested starting a podcast. It’d be called ‘The Offseason.’ It’d be casual and conversational with people inside and outside of volleyball.”

At Carolina, there is a definite tradition of excellence—whether it’s winning championships on the field or in the newsroom. For student-athletes like Adair Martin and Zoe Behrendt, the drive to succeed extends beyond competition and into the classroom, and it’s clear that their learnings in the Hussman School of Journalism and Media will keep these successes coming for years beyond their time playing lacrosse and volleyball.