What's Happening in Cougar Country

When looking for a new job – whether it’s a summer position as a high schooler or even changing careers 20 years after graduating from college – the old saying goes, it’s not always what you know, but who you know.

In only her second year at Ohio State as a Sports Industry major, Mackenzie Brugh (’23) has heard that many times already. So, when she got an email last winter (as a freshman in her first semester in college) with a job posting for a video assistant role with the Ohio State football team, she applied. 

“Video is not my passion,” she said, “but I wanted to get my foot in the door, get experience, and meet as many people as I could.” 

Early in the morning on Tuesday, January 21, just hours after Ohio State defeated Notre Dame, 34-23, to win the College Football Playoff National Championship, Brugh was being fitted for a championship ring. 

“I don’t know if we are going to get rings, but our boss said he was going to try to make sure we did get one,” she said. 

As an athlete her entire life, the Sports Industry major was a perfect fit for Brugh, who was a member of the Lake Catholic cross-country, basketball, flag football, and track teams. So, when she got that email before winter break during her first year, she was happy to apply for the position that would become a full-time job for her starting with the Buckeyes’ spring practices in 2024.  

“My interview for the position was right when I got back from winter break. I found out I got it a few weeks later,” said Brugh, who admitted the most she had ever filmed before was a few of her brother’s (Connor, Lake Catholic Class of 2027) games on an iPad. She was one of 15 students who made up the football coaches’ video production team. The team is led by an assistant director of video (Brugh’s direct boss) and the Director of Video Production.

During spring workouts and practices leading up to the annual Scarlet and Gray spring game, Brugh would work in the morning (with practices starting as early as 530a) and take classes in the afternoon. She was trained on her camera, tripod, and backup sources. She was also shown how to import and edit her videos, although she said that wasn’t a main function of her job this season. 

After the spring game, she was done working for the team for the summer and returned home.

“I was home for the summer but had to be back at school by the end of July,” she said. “My dorm room wasn’t even ready when I got back, so the team paid for me to stay in a hotel for a week while I worked.”

Unlike in the spring, during the fall, everything is in the afternoon. She would usually work Sunday nights, at least 2-7p Tuesdays through Thursdays, and then be at home games four to five hours before kickoff. But her entire work schedule was dependent upon what the football coaches wanted and how long they would actually practice.

“We don’t get priority scheduling like athletes, so I just had to make sure all my classes were in the morning because there were a lot of days we were there late – plenty of weeks when I worked more than 40 hours,” she said. 

Her job became the secondary sideline videographer tasked with filming the defense during practices from the sideline in a tower. 

“The tower wasn’t bad until the two weeks when they were practicing for Tennessee (the first round of the College Football Playoff),” she said. “It was about 15 degrees out, but it was 15-20 degrees colder up there. We had to have heaters up there with us.”

Her role was only to film practice. So, she didn’t travel to away games during the regular season. And it only took three of her team members to film the home games, but that doesn’t mean she was without a job.

“I was up with one of our cameras on the concourse by the big scoreboard,” she said. “The camera is so close to the fans that my job was actually to make sure they kept their hands down and out of the way of our shot.”

When Ohio State officially qualified for the playoffs, Brugh knew two things – One, she was going to be able to travel to the bowl games (assuming they kept winning). Because of the playoff schedule, the team traveled several days before each bowl game and practiced, which meant the video team had to be there with them. And two, she wasn’t going to get the holiday breaks that most college students enjoy.

“The Michigan game is Thanksgiving weekend, and we had practice Thanksgiving morning, but I was able to make it home in time for dinner,” she said. “After the loss to Michigan it was an intense two weeks of practices, and we worked a lot. I worked on Christmas Eve but was able to make it home and actually walked into 4 o’clock mass at St. John Vianney during the homily. And then we spent New Year’s Eve in a hotel in Los Angeles.”

It was there that the Buckeyes avenged one of their two regular season losses, beating No. 1 Oregon in the Rose Bowl. From there, it was more work than school for Brugh and the rest of her team.

• Ohio State football was excused from classes from January 6-10 (despite its general student population returning to school) because Texas, the Buckeyes' national semifinal opponent, was still on winter break. So, to make things equal, Ohio State didn’t have to attend classes either. 
• After the 28-14 win over Texas in the Cotton Bowl, according to Brugh, Ohio State head coach Ryan Day said they were there to win a National Championship, not to go to class; so they didn’t go to class the week of January 13-17 either. 
• Not to mention when they returned from both the Rose Bowl and the Cotton Bowl, Brugh and her team had to wait for the luggage truck at the Woody Hayes Athletic Center and then set up all the coaches' laptops. “We’d be at the facility usually from 4-7a when we got back,” she said.

“I definitely have a lot of work to make up,” she said. “I think most of the Sports Industry professors are used to people missing classes for stuff like this, but the (general education) professors aren’t. So, I did have some unexcused absences.”

Although Brugh said she still doesn’t think video is the career she’s going to pursue (her dream would be to work for the Cleveland Browns and the girls high school flag football program they’ve started), she definitely wants to keep this job for next season. She did say though that at her year-end meeting with her bosses she’s going to see what it will take to be a game-filmer next season.

“I learned so much this year, technically as a videographer, and what goes on in the sports industry,” she said. “Regardless of what team we work for and root for, there is a level of respect for each of the teams we played and their staffs because we all have a job to do. We need to maintain professional behavior. The only time all season that we didn’t contain ourselves was when Jack Sawyer scored against Texas.

“It was just very interesting being in that building every day. So much goes into a program like that. So many different operations people doing so many different jobs. And then, of course, the demand for perfection from the coaches and the players. Everyone working together for one goal. And they did it.”

And she might get a National Championship ring for it. Not too bad for a college job.