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Jenn Sterger gladly wore Oregon colors within venerable McArthur Court. She stood side-by-side with members of the Pit Crew as they cheered on the Oregon men’s basketball team.
She may be a Florida State student, but Saturday afternoon Sterger was a fan of everything green and yellow.
“Where else are you going to find a floor that shakes like you’re in California?” Sterger said afterwards. “That was probably the craziest part. I was standing there and I wasn’t moving, but the floor was.”
Sterger, in town this weekend to create a video for sportsillustrated.com, sported a tight green camouflage top with a yellow band along her left arm.
“People just respond to her,” said producer Pat Reidy, part of a three-man crew along with cameraman Sam Salerno and Sergio Reyes-Sheehan for SI.com. “Obviously, she’s beautiful and so guys respond to her in that sense of course, but then they talk to her a little bit and they see that she can talk sports just like one of the guys.”
Sterger writes a column for SI.com that ranges from opinions on games to relationship advice. Sterger says readers can relate to her as woman in her 20s experiencing the ups and downs of college life. With her column growing increasingly popular, Sports Illustrated started a video series that began with Wichita State, continued here this weekend and goes through four other schools, including Syracuse, LSU, Wisconsin and UNLV.
Though Oregon lost 77-74 to Arizona, Sterger left with an appreciation of the environment at McArthur Court and campus life at the University.
“Honestly, I don’t know why you’d ever want to get rid of a place like this,” said Sterger of McArthur Court. “The history alone and just the memories and stuff that come with this place (is) outstanding.”
Sterger had the opportunity to meet announcer Brent Musburger, who was in town with ex-UCLA coach Steve Lavin as part of the ABC telecast. Musburger noticed Sterger in the crowd of a Miami-Florida State football game in 2005 and told viewers, “15,000 young red-blooded American men just signed up to go to Florida State next semester.”
“I just thanked him,” she said. “I’m like ‘this is an amazing opportunity that you gave me and I took it and ran with it, and he said, ‘Any girl could have been captured on TV.’ He’s like, ‘the fact that you were smart enough to know what to do with it is what made it all.’”
More than meets the eye
Sterger acknowledges people’s interest in her looks, including her implant-augmented breasts. And yet, she emphasizes her love of sports from her passion for Florida State football to her depth of sports knowledge extending from college to professional sports.
“I’m not afraid to crack jokes on myself,” says Sterger, who occasionally makes the ditzy girl and fake boob jokes. “A little self-deprecation never hurt anyone, but at the same time, when I walk away from it, I want them to be able to say, ‘She was nothing like what I thought she was going to be.”
Sterger’s graced the pages of magazines “Maxim” and “Playboy.” The publications only increased interest in Sterger, who says she balances fame with being a normal college student, who is comfortable going out in sweatpants, a baseball hat and T-shirt.
“It’s a double-edged sword when you do stuff like that,” Sterger said of the magazines. “On one hand, it’s like, yes, I’m being recognized for the way I look on the outside, but at the same time, sometimes I feel like that’s all people see of me, and so I’m really glad that Sports Illustrated’s given me the opportunity to have a voice and have an opinion about stuff.”
Sterger has gradually adjusted to fame and the attention that comes along with it.
“Kids from your school – they usually are pretty cool with the fact that you know what they do,” Sterger said. “But then, every once in a while, you’ll get that awestruck freshman that will just follow you around and they’ll ask you for an autograph and I’m like, ‘I’m only a few years older than you. I’m nothing important.’”
At each stop on the video series, Sterger checks out the party scene, but with a twist – she’s stopped drinking since New Year’s. Rest assured, she does know how to drink with the best of them after working as a bartender in Tallahassee, Fla.
“I stopped cold turkey,” Sterger said. “It’s part of a college lifestyle and at the same time, I had a rough night a couple nights before New Year’s and I decided that that was going to be the turning point. I’m looking to make it until at least the opening day of Major League Baseball.”
Seeing the ins and outs of Oregon
Sterger and the production team arrived in Eugene Friday afternoon and began filming that evening. Nick Harrington, the younger brother of ex-Oregon quarterback Joey Harrington, gained the opportunity to host Sterger after campaigning for the gig through “Team Harrington,” a group on Facebook.
“I was afraid that she was going to be the kind of person who would blow me off,” Nick Harrington said. “But she listened and cared for what I had to say.”
The Emerald tagged along as the group, also featuring media services intern Aubrie Corey, visited the Casanova Center. With Nick Harrington and Corey interacting with Sterger on camera, they captured parts of Oregon’s athletic history in the Hall of Champions and visited the football team’s dazzling locker rooms.
“It was like (MTV) Cribs, but football,” said Sterger, “It was ridiculous. If that doesn’t get the recruits, I don’t know what does.”
Sterger leapt right into the action – wearing football pads, lifting the bar for squats and riding a stationary bike.
The group left the Casanova Center and headed for campus, where they tried filming a dodgeball tournament, but were turned away for privacy reasons. Undeterred, they headed to McArthur Court to film segments in the locker room of the men’s basketball team and on the court.
They even included center Ray Schafer, who stopped by to support camped-out Pit Crew members. He taught Sterger how to make a bank shot and dribble through her legs as his girlfriend watched from the sideline.
Outside, they filmed members of the Pit Crew, and after they finished filming, they ended the night with dinner at McMenamins restaurant behind Hayward Field.
Sterger passed out donuts to the Pit Crew early the next morning and hours later, stood at the front of the Pit Crew next to Nick Harrington. She had the chance to interview many of Oregon’s celebrity visitors, including Nike founder Phil Knight and Joey Harrington.
Hours after the game, Sterger stopped at Taylor’s Bar & Grille and sampled Eugene’s nightlife.
Sterger left Eugene early Sunday morning. The production crew now has another challenge – create a five minute segment with hours of footage so it can be released at 8 a.m. Wednesday on SI.com.
“We’ll really take a look at what highlights Oregon and what makes being a Duck special and interesting to people who maybe haven’t been here, like us,” producer Reidy said.
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