Watchdog

On moving to ESPN:

"It was a mutual convergence of events. It was amazing timing. ESPN had this idea in their minds of what they wanted to do with SportsCenter in the mornings at the same time I was freed of the CBS 'Early Show.'

"Virtually every day somebody from somewhere in the country would walk up and say, 'Do you miss sports?' And honestly the answer was, I really did. I was in it for 20 years, completely passionate about it, grew up around it. There’s nothing that matches the adrenaline and excitement of a sporting event and the way it’s a reflection or microcosm of what people go through with their achievements and dedication and failures.

"I always have found it fascinating on that level, too, so I had to honestly say I really did miss it and I’m so excited to get back to my roots, really excited."

On the commute from her home in Greenwich to Bristol:

"What is Bristol close to? I guess Hartford." (Storm said because of the commute and the fact she will write most of her own material, she will have to get up at around 4:30 a.m. even though she will not be on TV until 9.)

On the approach from 9 to noon:

"It’s not just everything that happened the night before, but a lot of breaking news, previewing what’s going to happen that night, water cooler issues, press conferences. I kind of like rocking and rolling a lot so I think in those three hours there will be a lot starting to cook and percolate."

On the show's expected audience:

"I imagine my audience is heavily male. It certainly was last time I was in sports. And then the sort of funny thing is I stepped into the morning show world where it was all women and a lot of them didn’t know me, and a lot of men sort of wondered where I went. So I have this really interesting dual set of people who know who I am.

"It’d be great to bring them together in some respects. I think that would be nice. I obviously feel sports is something for everybody. I have three daughters and they’re very much into sports. They are in fifth grade, fourth grade and first grade and they can all fill out an NCAA bracket.

"They're really excited I’m part of the Disney family, that’s the big deal. You know, the other Hannah. That’s the one they’re fascinated with." (That would be Hannah Montana, of course).

On whether she has followed sports closely of late:

"Obviously when I was with the Early Show I had to delve really heavily into politics, pop culture, music and the news. So in that sense there are only 24 hours in a day so at times depending on the news cycle I was very much into news.

"However for my free time, it was all about sports. For instance even though I was as a newscaster, let's go back a year, just for fun I went to the Notre Dame-USC game, I went to the Florida-Tennessee game, I went to the Super Bowl, I went to the U.S. Open, I went and sat in 20 degree temperatures to see the Red Sox play the Yankees, and I was at the Final Four, and none of that was for work. Well, the Super Bowl was for work for CBS.

"So that gives you an idea how much I paid attention to it. Plus, my husband [Dan Hicks] is at NBC Sports and he’s a golf host. So we talk about sports constantly. I’m pretty well rounded as a sportscaster or a newscaster. That's what you want to be to be a really good journalist anyway. You should know about all the things people are talking about and how sports fits into that panorama."

More on the commute:

"You and my mother are asking. It’s an hour and 20 minutes . . . A big thing for me having three children is being home by the time they get off the school bus. So a morning show really works great. I should be home by 2:30, 3 o’clock."

More on the new approach to SportsCenter: "You'll repeat it in a fresh way. It’s not just going to be a wheel that turns over and over and over. You’ll definitely know by the end of the day what’s happened."

So someone could watch all nine hours? "Hopefully most people have a little bit more of a life than that."

On the hyper-scrutiny bloggers and message boards give to sports TV personalities:

"I'm not going to read that. I’m going to be so busy doing my job and concentrating on that and I’ve always been sort of myopic that way and super positive. So I don’t like to sit around and read about myself. To me there’s a lot more interesting things to read about, so I will be reading up on all sports and everything that’s happening in the sporting world.

"But in terms of critiques of my performance, good or bad, that’s nothing that I’ve ever been obsessed with. I try to go in, work hard, do a great job with a good attitude and do my best. No matter if you do news or sports, every time I did a political interview there were people on both sides of the aisle, each of them saw it their own way.

"It's the same way with sports. It can be really polarizing. People can be critical. They have every right to do that. It’s nothing that’s going to change the core of who I am or how I do my job."