He shoots, he scores! Madison Square Garden internship is hockey fan’s dream

It’s any fan’s dream: Put on the jersey, strap on the helmet, pick up the stick and represent your favorite hockey team.

Jackson Yaeger ’22 poses in front of the camera, testing out shots for player cutaways to air during commercial breaks at Madison Square Garden. In full gear, he looks like he’s about to hit the ice with the rest of the New York Rangers.

As a lifelong sports enthusiast, this project alone might have made Yaeger’s recent marketing internships at “The World’s Most Famous Arena” an unforgettable experience. But over the course of two summers, the Master of Business Administration (MBA) student in Binghamton University’s School of Management (SOM) channeled his passion into exciting opportunities to develop marketing material and strategy integral to the Garden’s major athletic and live entertainment events as well as their key business partners.

“Sports are so intertwined with my personal life, but what you learn from sports can also factor into everyday business, and those unique skills can be implemented in any organization, whether they’re connected to sports or not,” Yaeger said. “In sports, problem-solving is the No. 1 driver to success, and what I enjoy most is exploring how issues related to sports can synergize with what we might deal with in our everyday lives.”

Yaeger grew up visiting the Garden for birthdays and family outings, often describing the arena as “his backyard away from home.” In high school, he was a United States Certified Youth Soccer Referee and a volunteer coach for youth basketball teams.

He’s just as avid a sports follower today – his “big four” teams are the Rangers, the Jets, the Knicks and the Mets – and he loves the community feel of sports fandom.

The strategy side of sports

When Yaeger came to Binghamton, pursuing a career in sports business was at the top of his mind. So, when he learned about open student associate positions at the Garden working with marketing teams, he had to take a shot.

During his first summer, from May to August 2022, Yaeger worked alongside a marketing and promotions team at Madison Square Garden Networks. Much of his work centered on social media content creation and client activations to an audience of some 600,000 followers.

That experience helped Yaeger flesh out his enjoyment of storytelling and creative thinking, skills he utilized even more during his second stint at the Garden as a graduate student associate from June to August 2023.

In a marketing partnerships team working with Madison Square Garden Sports and Entertainment, Yaeger worked on a group tasked with analyzing the potential of prospective clients and coming up with pitch strategies for companies forming a partnership with the Garden.

Yaeger assisted officials with crafting strategies that aligned with whatever key points or “partnership north stars” the company had in mind based on its target audience.

“That really showed me how I wanted to be involved in the strategy side and the creativeness behind the world of sports business. Plus, it was cool work. It involved pitches for billion-dollar companies that span across food and beverage, technology or fashion,” Yaeger said. “When you watch a game and you look at basketball, for example, you see a bunch of logos of companies around the court or the stadium. That was my team helping to put those kinds of partnership deals together.”

‘Whole new perspective’

Some of Yaeger’s other internship projects included case competitions, such as one that challenged him and other interns to come up with marketing strategies for the MSG Sphere in Las Vegas, which opened in September. As the competition’s winner, ideas Yaeger helped develop were closely considered by some of the company’s key stakeholders as a part of the venue’s marketing approach and overall launch.

Yaeger also shot video for social media channels during the Rangers’ playoff run, and he filmed a behind-the-scenes video to spotlight Jalen Brunson after he signed with the Knicks in July.

“You were able to see the games from a much different perspective. As a fan, you see how a team operates, but working at the Garden, you see how decisions are made and why they’re made,” Yaeger said. “Seeing that whole new perspective is fulfilling as a fan because it’s an experience someone outside the company would never know.”

Yaeger remains dedicated to a “dream job” in the field of sports business, but he isn’t overlooking the other opportunities his professional life could steer him toward, and his internships at the Garden will always hold a special place.

“Where else in the world would I be able to do this stuff?”