Nicole Auerbach has announced that Wednesday is her last day with The Athletic after seven years with the sports digital publication. Auerbach, who joined the company as a senior writer focusing on national college football and college basketball coverage in 2017, has been reporting on swimming this summer throughout the Olympic Games Paris 2024. Outside of her reporting on college athletics, she also works as a studio analyst on the Big Ten Network and a radio host for SiriusXM. Last year, she joined NBC Sports as a college football insider to appear on weekly editions of B1G College Countdown in the company’s first year with broadcast rights to the Big Ten Conference.
Auerbach announced the news on X and expressed gratitude for what the company was able to build from scratch. Furthermore, she conveyed that she had the chance to work with some of her best friends in journalism on a daily basis. Auerbach indicated that she has more to announce pertaining to her future plans soon and is excited about what is to come.
Auerbach joined The Athletic one year after its launch after working as a national college sports reporter for USA TODAY where she engaged in multiplatform reporting work. Before that time, she interned with a variety of publications while majoring in public policy at the University of Michigan. In 2020, Auerbach was honored as the youngest winner of the National Sports Writer of the Year award by the National Sports Media Association. Her departure from the outlet comes shortly before the start of the college football season, which is set to kick off with Week 0 matchups beginning on Saturday, Aug. 24.
Ari Wasserman, Max Olson and Kalyn Kahler have all recently left The Athletic as the publication continues operating under ownership of The New York Times Company. Earlier on Wednesday, the company reported $625.1 million in second-quarter revenue, a 5.8% year-over-year increase, and 10.8 million total subscribers. Nearly half of the 10.2 million digital-only subscribers are receiving more than one of the products that come from the company, including The Athletic, recipes, games and Wirecutter. As a standalone unit, The Athletic diminished its quarterly losses to $2.4 million while growing revenue to $40.5 million, indicative of a 33.4% year-over-year rise due to more subscribers (5.3 million) and augmented revenue from display advertising.
