MADISON, WI – In a large lecture hall at the Wisconsin School of Business, facing an audience of 200 students who look on intently, two students stand up to the podium and deliver their message:
The Wisconsin Sports Business Conference (WSBC) is set to host their marquee event of the same name, happening Thursday, March 6th at the Discovery Building, with a star-studded line-up of industry speakers and networking opportunities for students to get the skills and connections necessary to forge a career in the sports industry.
Adrian Wojarowski, the general manager of the men’s basketball program at St. Bonaventure University, and previously one of the NBA’s most prominent news reporters, is headlining the event, with other notable names like Chris LaPlaca, Karen Murphy, Jordan Solomon, and Lloyd Frischer. The event itself is backed by national and local brands like Morgan Stanley, Global Sports & Entertainment, the Milwaukee Bucks, the Milwaukee Brewers, and The Vault.
Taking a step back, for the many students who were at the lecture hall that day, the two students speaking at the podium were the co-founders and co-presidents of WSBC itself, Jaxon Zemachson and Devin Mehta.
Both Jaxon and Devin are students at UW-Madison and the Wisconsin School of Business.
Jaxon, a sophomore majoring in Marketing and Entrepreneurship, comes from Scarsdale, New York, where he always had a passion for sports and a special interest on the business side of the industry.
Devin, a sophomore majoring in Finance, Risk Management & Insurance, and Accounting, is from Milwaukee, Wisconsin, and is a member of the Wisconsin Investment Banking Club, Diverse Leaders of Tomorrow, and more.
The idea for the Wisconsin Sports Business Conference first took shape when Jaxon, in his senior year of high school, learned about and attended the Michigan Sports Business Conference, the largest undergraduate-run sports conference in the nation. Inspired by the potential to bring together so many like-minded individuals, and because Wisconsin is the only Big Ten university without a sports business major, Jaxon decided to execute on his vision.
He decided to pitch his idea for WSBC in his first semester at Madison, by building and marketing a simple presentation deck, and ultimately recruited a team of four other students to become the founding executive board.
Devin, at the time, was involved in other student organizations on campus, namely Diverse Leaders of Tomorrow, and the impact they had on mentorship and career development. He saw Jaxon’s presentation deck and recognized the impact WSBC could have on students who are interested in the sports business industry. Motivated by this opportunity to help, Devin joined WSBC initially as Director of Partnerships.
But not even a month in, Jaxon recognized Devin’s passion and ability for the idea, and made a midnight decision to make Devin co-founder and co-president. The rest is history, as they say.
The Wisconsin Sports Business Conference was officially founded in September 2023, making it almost two years old to this day. In these two years, Jaxon and Devin have built a community and team of individuals who are passionate about sports business at Wisconsin. Their student planning board includes themselves, the executive board, a marketing team, an event planning team, and a sales & partnership team, all composed of current UW-Madison students.
Now a week away from their marquee event, with a significant amount of funding raised and high-profile speakers secured, both Jaxon and Devin realize how supportive the Wisconsin alumni have been. WSBC has a 12-person alumni advisory board, who have been there every step of the way.
“The craziest moment for me, and my “Aha!” moment, was when I got an email back from Joel Embiid’s agent, who was a UW-Madison grad, who said he would love to talk to me. That was a really big milestone… where I looked back and realized the power of cold-emailing and cold-calling is just absurd, especially with a .edu address.”
– Jaxon Zemachson
Leading WSBC has been a transformative experience for both Jaxon and Devin. Jaxon was able to apply classroom practices to real-life situations in their organization, and help in delegating and managing responsibilities to get things done the right way. For Devin, he focused on leveraging his skills to drive execution and motivation, as it’s important for him to maintain a standard of excellence in their work.
Jaxon and Devin share this high standard and propensity for excellence, collaborating in decision-making and working with different personalities. In working together, they have been able to develop their approach to executing on new and board-reaching projects, often with no guidance, and breaking it down into practical steps of progress.
And as they prepare for the conference, Jaxon and Devin look out into the future of their project. WSBC is an idea and community that they both hope to come back to, even after 20 years, and to see it grow and evolve overtime. The alumni have supported them and the student team immensely, a tradition Jaxon and Devin look to pay forward in their foreseeable futures.
“I think our unique trademark at UW-Madison is that Badgers know what they want and they work exceedingly hard to get it. And for us, we look for that same type of person in the members we select, and we tend to find the same type of person in the alumni who support us. So continuing to find that breadth of people is something that excites me moving forward, and something that I hope remains the identity of the school, of our program, and the alumni involved in it.”
– Devin Mehta
From their experience, Jaxon and Devin share pieces of advice for those who are following in similar footsteps.
“When things go bad, there’s two ways to handle it. You can either sit there and cry about it, or you can get up and do something about it. There’s something that goes wrong everyday, and it’s on us to fix it and figure out what the path forward is.”
– Jaxon Zemachson
“Learn to question things. Be someone who seeks to understand, who wants to challenge their viewpoints in a way that allows them to see issues as more than black and white.”
– Devin Mehta
Regardless of their interest in sports business, students can make the most out of their experience at the Wisconsin Sports Business Conference on Thursday, March 6th at the Discovery Building.
The conference will be a place where students will hear from many different industry leaders, from Executive Vice Presidents of the NFL and Senior Vice President of the MLB, to the founder and partner of private equity shop Arctos Partners, to the Chief Operating Officer of the Chicago Bears, and more.
Attendees will get to participate in panels that discuss how to prepare and get into a career in sports, how women’s sports became a billion-dollar industry, the blueprint of North American sports leagues, sports as an asset class and investment, and the future of college athletics after NIL.
Through and through, this conference will be a great opportunity you won’t want to miss.