Hana Connelly worked at an Arkansas-based TV station last summer reporting on football for the University of Arkansas. Courtesy | Hana Connelly

Junior Hana Connelly grew up watching televised sports games and dreaming of being like Fox Sport’s sideline reporter Erin Andrews. Now, she’s the college radio station’s first sideline reporter.

Starting this year, Connelly’s job includes covering football, baseball, and men and women’s basketball home games, a role that previously didn’t exist at WRFH Radio Free Hillsdale 101.7 FM, according to the station’s General Manager Scot Bertram.

“I’ve always wanted to do sideline reporting, and coming to Hillsdale, I kind of had squashed that dream because the broadcasting department wasn’t super big,” Connelly said. “When I went home my first summer, I felt like the Lord said to me, ‘Why are you closing your own doors?’ And so I went to the radio station and talked to Mr. Bertram, and he helped me to get super involved.”

As a sideline reporter at Hillsdale, Connelly said she has enjoyed seeing close-up interactions between players and the coaches.

“It’s funny when you see a player do something wrong, and the coach will come over and get a little aggressive, they yell at them and straighten them out. It’s kind of intimidating,” Connelly said. “To be on the field to watch specific players, see who’s hurt, know exactly what’s wrong with them, and to be involved with that perspective is super awesome.”

A native Floridian, Connelly comes from a family of Gators fans. Her father still holds the record for the most career tackles at the high school both he and Hana attended. Hana herself played volleyball and flag football in high school.

“I’ve been involved in that life for a really long time,” she said.

When Fresno State University’s play-by-play announcer Paul Loeffler contacted Bertram looking for a spotter in its opening football game against the University of Michigan, Bertram recommended Connelly as a “great fit.”

According to Connelly, she sat in the booth with Fresno State’s announcers on Aug. 31, using binoculars and a sheet with the players’ names and numbers to identify the players making tackles.

“It was their opening game in the Big House and there were 107,000 people there. And obviously, Michigan is the previous national championship winner, so they had a lot of clout,” Connelly said. “I met all of the Fresno State radio people, and a lot of them were ex-NFL players, which is really awesome.”

Bertram said such opportunities to practice and hear professionals broadcasting helps students gain new ideas for improvement.

“She came away having been involved in a Division 1 football broadcast with a lot more ideas, a lot more confidence in what she was doing, and an even better understanding of how that sideline position works in the scope of a broadcast,” Bertram said.

Connelly interned last summer with Fox affiliate KNWA News in Arkansas, where she covered football for the University of Arkansas and made reels and packages for the station.

“Hana has really taken every opportunity presented to her to improve herself and find more information about the industry and how it works,” Bertram said. “She has confidence in herself, which bleeds over into the broadcasting aspects, and that’s a key attribute. People like to hear someone who is strong and confident out here.”

As WRFH’s sports director, Connelly organizes home game broadcasts and hosts the radio feature “Charger Rundown” alongside junior Evan Mick, the radio station’s assistant sports director.

“It’s a lot of fun working with Hana,” Mick said. “When she’s interviewing somebody, she’s having a conversation. She’s not just asking them the questions that she has on her list. She’s still making up questions as you go along, because she wants to actually get to know about you.”

Connelly said she intends to pursue a career in broadcasting after college, whether it involves sports or otherwise, and that her experience sideline reporting has been “a really good start.”

“It’s cool to start something at college that has never been there before,” Connelly said, “I had the opportunity to start something really awesome, that I hope will stay when I leave, for people that do love sports and want to sideline report or go into broadcasting of some sort.”