COVER STORY
Tampa Bay’s Own Junior
Reporter Hits The NHL
All-Star Red Carpet
Covering The All-Star game, Became More
Fun Than Work
By Wyatt Ross
While the pirates were invading Tampa Bay, (Gasparilla Parade),
I was in San Jose at the 2019 NHL All-Star weekend. Last year,
I interviewed some of the stars here in Tampa Bay, and this year, they
wanted me back.
Since it was my first time last year, I only did red carpet interviews, but this
time the league asked me for even more. It took a whole day to get to San
Jose, and once we arrived, I got the rest of that day to relax. The next day,
though, was time to get to work.
On Thursday afternoon, I arrived in the All-Star park to shoot a new intro.
The shoot was pretty cool, but we had to shoot a bunch of retakes, because
people kept on getting in the shot.
When we finished up with the new intro, we went inside for Media Day.
First up, I got some interview tips from NHL Network broadcasters Kevin
Weekes, Jackie Redmond and Jamie Hersch. I got some tips from Kev and
Jamie together at the same time, and they really helped me down on the
ground.
First, though, I had a special message for Kevin from one of his former
teammates, Jason Cullimore. Cully wanted me to tell Kevin, “You know,
you’re doing a really good job as a broadcaster. In fact, you might be a
better broadcaster than you were a goalie.” Kevin had a good laugh at that
one! After sitting with Kevin and Jamie, I got to talk to Jackie Redmond and
get some helpful pointers from her. Then it was on to some actual player
interviews.
I headed down to the main floor to talk to some of our stars and try out
some of the tips that I had just learned. Talking to the players was
beyond fun.
First, I talked to Mathew Barzal of the New York Islanders and last season’s
rookie of the year. He was super nice to me
and I had a lot of fun interviewing him.
Then I interviewed Claude Giroux, captain
of the Philadelphia Flyers. Something that
really stood out to me was when I asked
Claude Giroux and Mathew Barzal both the
same question, “who are you most excited
to play with?” they both gave each other as
the answer.
When I told Giroux what Mathew had said, he replied, “he’s a pretty smart
guy, you know.” This had us both laughing, and I’m almost positive the
audience did too.
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