Alabama press reporter Kelly receives Aschoff Award

• Chris Low, ESPN Senior WriterAug 8, 2024, 07:09 PM ET

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  • College football reporter
  • Joined ESPN.com in 2007
  • Graduate of the University of Tennessee

Nick Kelly, formerly of The Tuscaloosa News and now with AL.com, is the 5th recipient of the Edward Aschoff Rising Star Award, which is named after the cherished ESPN college football press reporter who died on Christmas Eve in 2019 on his 34th birthday from previously undetected Phase 4 non-Hodgkin lymphoma in his lungs.The award exists each year by the Football Writers Association of America(FWAA)to one promising journalist no older than 34 who has not just the talent and work ethic it takes to prosper in business, however likewise the passion to make it better.” I hope I can continue his legacy of really making an influence on people and the method he did his job,” Kelly stated.”I really do hope I can continue to do that. It is such an honor to get an award with his name on it.” Kelly, 26, finished from the University of Missouri in 2020. He was recognized for his outstanding deal with the Alabama football beat and coverage in the consequences of Nick Saban’s retirement. Kelly accepted a writing position with AL.com ahead of the 2024 football season.Wilson Alexander of The Advocate was the 4th winner of the award in 2023. Other previous winners consist of former Sports Illustrated press reporter and current CBS Sports press reporter Richard Johnson(2022), The Athletic’s Grace Raynor (2021)and The Athletic’s David Ubben(2020). Kelly joined The Tuscaloosa News in 2021. He worked as an intern with Boston World Media and worked for the Columbia Missourian and Minneapolis Star-Tribune before taking on the Alabama beat. “When I joined The Tuscaloosa News in 2021, you understood with Nick Saban’s retirement, there was a good possibility I would be covering it,”Kelly stated. “I believe you were constantly psychologically prepared for it. It was surreal when it happened, however at the same time I was gotten ready for the plan of action.” Kelly credits Tommy Deas, his editor at the Tuscaloosa News, for assisting put that strategy into action when news broke of Saban’s retirement on Jan. 10. Kelly was able to use his relationship with Saban’s kids– Nicholas and Kristen– to produce a profile of life after retirement

for the entire family. Kelly stated the essential to producing material that stuck out because month was asking the ideal internal questions. “How can we use the relationships I’ve integrated in my time here to inform different aspects of the story? “Kelly stated.”Everybody was talking about it.

Everybody needed to know about it. No information was too little, so it was a matter of,’How can we cultivate those details?'” Kelly stated he took two lessons from the late Cecil Hurt, the longtime writer at The Tuscaloosa News who died in 2021, to stay grounded on the Alabama beat. Kelly said Hurt was authentic at all times but also worked the beat with the tongue-in-cheek mantra of” everybody else understands more than you do.”” The humbleness of’ individuals know more than you do’ is such a mindset I attempt to keep when I go about my work,”he said.Kelly stated he likewise has an appreciation for Aschoff, whose tradition withstands with the Rising Star Award.”I’m aware of his tradition and seeing what individuals have actually said about him, “Kelly stated.” Discovering I’m winning an award named for him is truly, really cool due to the fact that I understand what he achieved in a brief time.”Aschoff, a 2008 graduate of the University of Florida, was a gifted writer, whether he was on camera or crafting a composed piece. And even as his profession at ESPN blossomed into more of a nationwide tv role when he moved to Los

Angeles in 2017, he still guided and befriended younger reporters along the method.