BRENDEN MARTIN Sun Sports Editor
Brenden Martin covers Northern Arizona athletics with a focus on Northern Arizona University football, athletic department leadership and local high school and youth sports. He works as sports editor at Arizona Daily Sun, shaping coverage of college, prep and community teams for the masthead. His reporting blends game analysis, injury and roster news and human stories around the programs he follows.
NAU football and Big Sky focus
Martin’s core beat is Northern Arizona University football, and much of his work is built around the team’s week‑to‑week fortunes.
He reports on games with attention to specific turning points, such as red‑zone turnovers that cost NAU an upset bid against top‑ranked Montana State. He tracks the defensive side of the ball closely, covering both the unit’s national standing and the impact of key injuries on that performance.
His coverage drills into coaching storylines as well as on‑field results.
Pieces on defensive coordinator Trenton Greene frame matchups in terms of personal history, including Greene’s return to face a former team with a high‑performing defense behind him. Features on players like Ammon Allen and Nikhil Webb‑Walker highlight adversity and comeback narratives, explaining how unusual circumstances off the field shape their impact when they return to play. Across these stories Martin ties NAU’s season arc to the wider Big Sky Conference context, showing how individual games intersect with conference rankings and reputations.
Athletic director search and leadership coverage
Beyond game coverage, Martin follows the leadership structure around NAU athletics, particularly the search for and transition of the university’s athletic director.
His reporting has included coverage of the national search process, from narrowing the field of finalists to the decision point for the next athletic director. He then moved into profile work once Richard Duran was selected, explaining how quickly the search wrapped up and what kind of environment Duran is stepping into.
In his writing on Duran, Martin details both the ceremonial and practical sides of the hire, describing introductions at the student‑athlete high performance center and the early steps the new director takes to assess the department. On digital platforms he adds breaking news elements, posting the hire before formal announcements and capturing Duran’s stance on NAU’s long‑term commitment to the Big Sky Conference. This combination of enterprise coverage and live updates shows that Martin treats athletic administration as part of the sports beat rather than a separate campus story.
Local high school and youth sports reporting
Martin’s remit extends into prep and youth sports, where he regularly covers football and baseball programs around Flagstaff and Northern Arizona. Game stories on Coconino High School football focus on momentum swings and tactical wrinkles, such as trick plays that transform a close contest into a shutout after halftime.
His pieces on Little League baseball revisit long local histories, including a story about a team reaching a state championship for the first time since the 1950s and drawing on the experience of a grandfather who played on that earlier title team.
He also contributes to broader local sports roundups, where multiple teams and sports are stitched together into quick updates. Across these assignments he keeps attention on how community programs fit into Northern Arizona’s broader sports culture, with family ties, multi‑generation stories and league milestones appearing alongside scores and standings. This strand of his work positions him as a point person for narratives that link grassroots sports with the region’s college scene.
Digital presence and background in athletics communications
Martin brings a background in sports information and student journalism to his current role. Before joining Arizona Daily Sun he worked in athletics communications as a graduate assistant, handling sports information duties for multiple collegiate programs and managing coverage for sports including men’s soccer, swimming and beach volleyball.
He previously edited and reported for NAU’s student‑run newspaper, where he covered NAU sports and the Big Sky Conference while overseeing layouts and social media output for the sports section.
His professional profiles on social platforms describe him as a sports editor who remains active in real‑time coverage, sharing breaking news, career updates and follow‑ups tied to his reporting. Posts about NAU’s athletic director hire and the university’s relationship with the Big Sky Conference show him using these channels to extend and reinforce his print and online stories. Taken together, his background and current output mark him as a beat reporter who pairs traditional game and feature writing with a communications‑savvy digital presence.
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