The PHWA mourns the loss of USA Hockey assistant executive director Jim Johannson.
Johannson didn’t just have a relentless passion for the game of hockey and his country, he was always helpful in working with our organization to enhance the coverage of the players and teams he cared deeply about.
Our deepest condolences to USA Hockey and the Johannson family.
(Photo courtesy USA Hockey)
For today’s members of the Professional Hockey Writers’ Association, Red Fisher was a link to a different time. A time before the internet, when hockey writers wearing Fedoras wrote willowy prose on typewriters, quotes scrawled on a notepad and a cigar burning in a nearby ashtray. A time when reporters and players gained trust in each other, because they had enough one-on-one time to allow for such a relationship to be built.
Long before Twitter and blanket TV coverage, they were our only daily links to the teams we loved. People like Red, Frank Orr, and Dick Beddoes — if they wrote it, it was true. Period.
Since his first NHL game — the Richard Riots of March 17, 1955 — until very recently, Red chronicled the Montreal Canadiens. He covered the 1972 Summit Series, was an Elmer Ferguson Award winner, received the Order of Canada, and numerous National Newspaper Awards in Canada.
A podcast with Eric Stephens of the Orange County Register on multi-week road trips, covering hockey in Southern California and being a person of color who cover hockey:
A podcast with Mark Spector of Sportsnet on serving as president of the Professional Hockey Writers Association, awards voting, media access and covering hockey in Edmonton:
A podcast with Sean Leahy of NBC’s Pro Hockey Talk on working for a NHL rights holder, leaving Yahoo and covering hockey in New York:
The Professional Hockey Writers Association (PHWA) is proud to announce Michael Russo as the inaugural winner of the Red Fisher Award, which recognizes to the top overall beat reporter from the 2016-17 season, as voted by his peers.
Russo, who recently joined The Athletic Minnesota after a 12-year run at the Minneapolis Star-Tribune, narrowly edged out finalists Aaron Portzline (The Athletic) and Larry Brooks (New York Post) in an incredibly close vote.
Longtime NHL broadcaster Dave Strader passed away this morning following a battle with cancer. He was 62.
A podcast with Erik Erlendsson of Lightning Insider on covering hockey in Florida, starting his own Web site and dealing with John Tortorella.
A podcast with Chris Johnston of Sportsnet on working for a NHL rights holder, covering the Maple Leafs and a shared heritage with Justin Williams:
The Professional Hockey Writers Association is proud to announce Sylvanna Gross as 2017 winner of the Jim Kelley Memorial Scholarship.
Gross is the daughter of PHWA member and Bergen (N.J.) Record reporter Andrew Gross, who has covered the Devils and Rangers since 2001. Despite falling short in the inaugural contest one year ago, Gross entered again this summer determined to win.
“The children of writers tend to have a knack with words, so I wasn’t disappointed participating last year and not winning because I knew I was up against strong writers,” Gross said. “It made me work harder this year and spend more time tightening up the narrative. It is a surprise to me that I won, and I’m very thankful I did.”