‘The power of incredible storytelling’
Jaycie Schenone, who worked on ESPN’s “The Last Dance,” knows her story. Because of it, she has devoted herself to sharing the sports stories that surround her.
by Hallie Hart
Jaycie Schenone had a good reason for finishing her college career a week early.
She had landed a production internship at ESPN, and her first major assignment involved gathering archival footage for a 10-part documentary about Michael Jordan and the Chicago Bulls. That film series, “The Last Dance,” attracted an average of 5.6 million viewers per episode, setting an ESPN documentary record as it provided people with the thrilling sports storylines they craved during the COVID-19 pandemic.
In 2019, as Schenone was nearing the end of her senior year at the University of Oregon, she didn’t know that would happen. After receiving a call about her internship duties, she excitedly shared the news with her father and altered her schedule to make everything work. Schenone completed her exams before finals week and traveled to the other side of the country to start working for ESPN, briefly hopping back to Eugene for graduation.
“It didn’t even matter what project they told me I was working on,” Schenone said. “I just wanted to learn from them in some capacity, and obviously, ESPN was a dream place to do that.”
She contributed to a massive project about one of the world’s most famous athletes, but that wasn’t the only reason she loved her internship, which set her up for a full-time position as an ESPN production assistant. Schenone’s deep passion for storytelling guides her through her career. It doesn’t matter whether she is giving audiences insight into the lives of NBA legends or drawing attention to young, up-and-coming athletes who have rarely been in the public eye before. Her connection to their tales of adversity and triumph is personal.
Schenone has her own story of overcoming hardship as an athlete. Because of it, she’s devoted herself to sharing the stories of others.
Her entire trajectory changed during one summer.
The youngest of three daughters, Schenone spent her childhood learning from her dad on a baseball diamond. She loved playing softball in high school, but a severe leg injury ended her athletic career before her junior year. After an ACL surgery that nearly required leg amputation, Schenone was confined to her bed for the whole summer. She couldn’t walk, let alone round the bases on a softball field.
Today, she has a sense of humor about her situation, using her ACL surgery as a reminder for people who wonder how to pronounce her surname: The last two syllables sound like “no knee.” At the time, Schenone’s physical pain took a toll on her mental health. It was like a piece of her identity had been ripped away from her.
“I just felt as low as I think I’ve ever been in my life because I could no longer play,” Schenone said. “I remember going to one game after I was no longer bedridden, and I saw my team play, and I just completely fell apart because I realized at that moment, I was no longer gonna be involved in sports in any capacity.”
Fortunately for Schenone, that wasn’t entirely true.
During Schenone’s recovery, her mother boosted her spirits with two sources of inspiration. One was a magazine article about a woman who bounced back after a knee injury and amputation to compete in triathlons. The other was the HBO Series “Real Sports with Bryant Gumbel,” which introduced Schenone to captivating stories about athletes who weren’t widely known to the public.
“I had this turning point of, like, you can go either way,” Schenone said. “You can either choose to no longer be involved and lose out on something you love so dearly … or you can find a way to still be involved.”
With renewed motivation from the sports stories that surrounded her, Schenone turned to writing. She had always enjoyed English in school, but after her injury, she approached her craft with a new level of enthusiasm.
At the University of Oregon, she intended to use broadcast journalism as her avenue for storytelling, but she soon found herself wondering if she belonged in the field.
When people learned about Schenone’s intended career path, she heard the same reactions over and over.
“You’re attractive, so you’ll do great.”
“Oh, you’ll do fine. You’re pretty.”
The comments weren’t intentionally negative, but they reduced her to a stereotype of a woman in sports broadcasting.
“That’s not going to give me any confidence,” Schenone said. “That’s not going to solidify my career. … It actually did a total reverse psychology on me and made me feel like I wasn’t meant to be in this industry.”
Schenone wanted respect for her storytelling abilities instead of her appearance, so she shifted to working behind the camera. The art of filmmaking fascinated her. It connected her to people, and it connected audiences to the rich stories depicted in the films, providing viewers with the joy of shared experiences.
“You can either choose to no longer be involved and lose out on something you love so dearly … or you can find a way to still be involved.”
“The Last Dance” exemplified this magic of sports documentaries. As fans sat in their homes during the COVID-19 pandemic and waited for live games to return, timeless highlights of Michael Jordan — along with teammates such as Scottie Pippen Jr. and Dennis Rodman — filled that void. Around the world, the docuseries ascended to the forefront of pop culture as viewers shared Jordan memes on Twitter and eagerly discussed the Bulls in podcast episodes. Spotify released a playlist featuring songs from all 10 docuseries episodes, and Peloton even created a “The Last Dance”-themed workout.
“I know it helped so many people out there that just were struggling and needed something to look forward to at that time,” Schenone said. “Through all the terrible things that were happening, it was a glimmer of hope.”
The Bulls’ off-court fashions, Jordan’s iconic dunks and the beats from artists including Coolio and A Tribe Called Quest gave audiences a slice of ‘80s and‘90s basketball nostalgia. Schenone had sifted through archives to unearth clips that created this mood. She watched games, SportsCenter segments and more, using the VHS tapes she digitized as her time capsule into the world of Jordan’s heyday, which started before she was born.
Schenone’s career is young, but her work has already instilled wisdom in her. One of her most meaningful experiences so far was directing a short espnW feature about Sydney Mesher, the first differently abled Radio City Rockette. On Christmas morning in 2019, the film aired on SportsCenter. Schenone has treasured opportunities to tell stories with themes deeper than sports: disability representation, inclusion of transgender athletes and the importance of mental health.
Through it all, Schenone never loses sight of her story. It’s the artifact that reminds her where she’s been and the compass that shows her where to go. Storytelling provided her with positivity when she needed it most, and years later, she saw how a 10-part-documentary could provide sports fans with that same optimism during a time of isolation and confusion.
“That’s the power of incredible storytelling is uniting people through pain, through sorrow, through happiness, everything, across the board,” Schenone said. “It brings people together, and that’s been since the beginning of time. Storytelling has been a foundation of our society from the beginning of time.
“It’s just a matter of finding new ways to do that and to make sure it resonates with your audiences when they need it most, and I think ‘The Last Dance’ is a perfect example of that coming together.”