Two Hofstra student journalists earn Super Bowl 2024 assignment in Las Vegas

Hofstra students Yaw Bonsu and Michelle Rabinovich are spending Super Bowl week on Radio Row in Las Vegas, covering this year’s big game between San Francisco and Kansas City.

But this isn’t just two students getting an opportunity. These are two peers who helped create that opportunity through hard work and research, while never forgetting to give the other a playful punch in the arm along the way.

The camaraderie between Bonsu and Rabinovich is infectious, especially when it comes to answering questions.

“Ladies first,” Bonsu said. “You were already supposed to go first with all these questions.”

“Why do you put me on the spot like that?” Rabinovich asked.

Bonsu, from Baldwin, helped bring this Super Bowl dream to reality at Hofstra after seeing the success of a similar program at Syracuse University, where the senior spent his freshman year before transferring.  After pitching it to the School of Communications and receiving media credentials, the university agreed to financially support the trip.

The two students left on Sunday and will get to interview players. Bonsu and Rabinovich also will get to talk to professional sports journalists in the field. .

“I want to see the iron that’s going to sharpen me for the rest of my life,” Rabinovich said. “I want to see what makes them tick. I want to see their processes.”

Brooklyn's Rabinovich is a bilingual student who comes from a family of Russian immigrants. Neither the junior nor Bonsu thought this would happen at Hofstra. That’s especially true of Rabinovich, who said she was jumping for joy with her mother and stepfather when she heard the news before receiving her first standing toast at Shabbat dinner that weekend.

“I never imagined this,” Rabinovich said. “If you told freshman year me that I’d be going to the Super Bowl as a member of the press, I’d be like, ‘What are you talking about?’ ”

Hofstra had sent students virtually to the Super Bowl for media week in the past thanks to Bonsu’s efforts, but this is the first time Hofstra students are going in person after faculty selected Bonsu and Rabinovich.

“I think this is more so great, because I know the great things [Rabinovich] is going to do in the future,” Bonsu said. “Our relationship started as a ‘game recognize game’ type of thing, with both of us having respect for each other’s work at the station … being close to her, I know she has a lot of potential.”

The students return on Thursday. Whether Bonsu interviews Patrick Mahomes — in his words, he’s attracted to greatness — or Rabinovich gets to talk to Travis Kelce or Brock Purdy, this is yet another step in the journey of two Hofstra students on the way to becoming the sports journalists they plan to be.