Who Are the Announcers and Referees for Eagles-Commanders?

The long and winding road to Super Bowl LIX makes a pivotal stop here: The (2) Philadelphia Eagles will host the (6) Washington Commanders for the NFC championship game on Sunday at 3 p.m. ET.

Jalen Hurts and the Eagles are set to face off against rookie Jayden Daniels and the Commanders at Lincoln Financial Field for a spot in the big game. It would be, of course, Daniels’s first appearance in the Super Bowl while Hurts made an appearance two seasons ago in 2022.

As the two young quarterbacks go head-to-head in the NFC title contest, the game’s announcers will be trying to make the fan experience as enjoyable as possible while the referees will be enforcing fair play across all four quarters.

Here’s a look at who’s calling and officiating the Eagles-Commanders game.

Announcers for Eagles vs. Commanders

The lead play-by-play announcer is Kevin Burkhardt. He will be joined in the booth by analyst Tom Brady.

Burkhardt has over a decade of experience calling NFL games and shared broadcasting duties with Greg Olsen last year. This marks Brady’s third playoff game in his rookie season as an announcer after calling Eagles-Packers in the wild-card round and Lions-Commanders in the divisional round.

Erin Andrews and Tom Rinaldi will report from the sideline. The rules analyst is Mike Pereira.

Broadcast Network and Production Team

Fox will broadcast the Eagles-Commanders game.

FOX Sports, one of the most widely acclaimed sports broadcast networks in the business, will trot out pregame and halftime shows for the game. The shows are usually hosted by former NFL players Terry Bradshaw, Howie Long, Jimmy Johnson and Michael Strahan.

Future Hall-of-Fame tight end Rob Gronkowski has been known to make an appearance on the Fox broadcast from time to time, too.

Referees for Eagles vs. Commanders

Head Referee (Crew Chief)

The crew chief is Shawn Hochuli.

Hochuli, the son of former referee Ed Hochuli, is working his first conference title game having previously worked eight career playoff games.

The Eagles are 6-1 when Hochuli calls their games while the Commanders are 1-3 all-time. This marks the third time Hochuli will call a game between the two NFC East rivals.

In the 2024 season, Hochuli called 16 games in total. He is known to have one of the highest penalty counts among NFL referees this year with 13.81 penalties per game and 113.19 penalty yards, both above the league average.

However, in Hochuli’s last playoff game—the Kansas City Chiefs’ divisional round win against the Buffalo Bills last season—only seven total penalties were called.

As for some recent highlights in Hochuli’s officiating career: last November, Hochuli called a false start penalty in German during the Carolina Panthers-New York Giants international game at Allianz Arena in Munich.

Hochuli was the referee in the Commanders’ 20-19 win over the New Orleans Saints in Week 15, when the officials accidentally stopped the game clock with nine seconds remaining. The clock was stopped for four seconds, allowing the Saints to spike the ball for one more potential game-winning play. Washington ended up holding on for the victory, but Hochuli admitted the official’s mistake in the postgame pool report and said the situation was not one that was reviewable.

Hochuli also gave Tom Brady his first unsportsmanlike conduct penalty of his career in the Los Angeles Rams’ divisional round win against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers in the 2022 season.

Full Officiating Crew

Here are the other referees and officials involved in the Eagles-Commanders game.

Time & Channel for Eagles vs. Commanders

The game will kick-off on Sunday, Jan 26., at 3 p.m. ET at Lincoln Financial Field. You can watch it on Fox as well as any other streaming service that carries Fox.