Michigan native Michelle Crechiolo grew up rooting for the Detroit Red Wings, but she ended up taking a job with the Pittsburgh Penguins – just a year after the Pens won the 2009 Stanley Cup over the Wings.
That Cup win did not make Pens team captain Sidney Crosby very popular in her hometown.
“A lot of my friends and family did not like him, and some still don’t. But I was a fan,” Crechiolo said. “I just had so much respect for him. After I graduated and was looking for a job, I remember thinking about how cool it would be to work for the Penguins and get to cover him on a daily basis. I’ve gotten to do that for 15 seasons and be part of two Stanley Cup championships along the way.”
Crechiolo serves as the Penguins team reporter, covering the team on a daily basis both at home and on the road; handling the production of written content for the official website and app; and running a team-affiliated X account called Pens Inside Scoop. She also contributes to multiple other platforms, including the Penguins Radio Network, PensTV, SportsNet Pittsburgh and the Penguins social media channels.
On Jan. 8, 2024, Crechiolo became the first woman to do play-by-play or color commentary on a local TV or radio broadcast for any of Pittsburgh’s three big-league teams when she was a radio analyst for a Penguins-Flyers broadcast on the club’s flagship radio station, 105.9 the X.
Crechiolo began her journey into hockey at 4 years old when she began playing the sport, following in the footsteps of her older brother. She played defense.
“I just fell in love with it,” Crechiolo said. “I played all the way through high school and college.”
Hockey was a sport that Crechiolo said she always had a natural affinity for.
“The feeling of gliding around on the ice – I said to one of my colleagues that the sound of sticks and pucks is like ASMR in a way,” she said.
She decided to go to college at Michigan State. Growing up only an hour and a half away from the university, Crechiolo found that their journalism program, hockey team, and close vicinity to a big city like Detroit checked all the boxes for her.
From a young age, Crechiolo had known she wanted a career involving hockey.
“I knew that I wanted to work in the NHL in some capacity, but I didn’t know exactly what direction,” Crechiolo said. “I had always loved reading and writing. I feel like I was open to any possibilities.”
At Michigan State, Crechiolo was presented with a big opportunity: interning with the Detroit Red Wings, thanks to a recommendation from her journalism professor. That internship, in turn, paved the way for Crechiolo to get a job with the Pittsburgh Penguins.
Jen Bullano, who is now the chief communications officer for the Penguins, had sent out a note to all the NHL teams seeking applicants for a manager of content position for the Pens. People in the Red Wings organization encouraged Crechiolo to apply, and she got the job.
“At the time, it was very popular to be your own in-house media center using the team website,” Bullano said. “We decided a second writer was necessary, and Michelle was the perfect choice.”
Crechiolo nabbed the position at only 22 years old, something that she feels incredibly grateful for.
“I’m around the same age as Crosby, Evgeni Malkin, and Kris Letang, so it feels like I’ve been on this journey alongside them this whole time,” Crechiolo said.
As team reporter, Crechiolo follows the Penguins throughout the day. In the morning, she will start her game preparations before attending morning skate in Cranberry when the Pens are at home.
Crechiolo then returns home to finish her game preparations before heading over to PPG Paints Arena.
“I then do a radio hit a half hour before every puck drop, and then I go straight upstairs to the studio,” Crechiolo said. She also creates the pregame update, which airs on the video scoreboard before each home game.
From there, she will track the game and write her own highlights for her intermission
reports, while simultaneously posting on Pens Inside Scoop account.
“I feel like I don’t look up until the start of the third period,” Crechiolo laughed. “That’s when I’ll typically start writing my post-game recap.”
After the game, she heads to the locker room to do post-game interviews with players, finishing up around 11 p.m.
Away games hold a totally different set of responsibilities for Crechiolo. Since the Penguins only travel with one content person, Crechiolo handles all the team’s social media duties when she is on the road. She gets pictures of the players arriving at the rink, gearing up in the locker room, and during warmups.
“The road feels like a vacation because I don’t have any of the show elements,” Crechiolo said.
Through her job, Crechiolo has developed close working relationships with coworkers and players alike, particularly with Crosby, Malkin and Letang.
“I think that’s one of the things I’m most proud of at this point in my career,” Crechiolo said. “It does take a lot to get to a point where the guys know and trust you, and are willing to do what you ask of them. For me, it took years.”
She has had no problem establishing the same working relationships with younger players as they have come in, including Jake Guentzel, a former Pen who first joined the team in 2017.
“I feel like he’s one player from throughout the years who was close with all of the staff. He was always laughing and joking with us,” Crechiolo said. “Being there every step of the way, from the day players join the organization via draft, trade, or free agency, and putting in the work to build those rapports with guys over time so that I can help people get to know them, it definitely pays off.”
Her ability to help players open up allowed her to write a feature on Crosby, interviewing players from across the league. In this article, she focuses on how Crosby’s leadership extends off the ice. It features anecdotes from NHL stars like Nathan MacKinnon and Matt Duchene, as well as several former Penguins players.
Her reporting duties aren’t confined to just the Penguins. She has interviewed many NHL greats.
“I talked to Marc-Andre Fleury a few times these last couple of seasons as he heads into retirement. Interviewing Fleury after his last game in Pittsburgh was emotional. I think having a good relationship with ‘Flower’ helped a difficult situation,” Crechiolo said.
She got the opportunity to interview Alex Ovechkin this season, who was in town for the regular-season finale.
“There is so much mutual respect between him and Sidney Crosby, who had such nice things to say when Ovechkin broke the all-time goals record. So I wanted to get Ovechkin returning the favor,” Crechiolo said.
Bullano, the team official who helped Crechiolo get her first job with the Pens, recognizes her talent and has watched her grow over the years.
“Michelle excels at storytelling, but perhaps her best quality is listening,” Bullano said. “She has humanized so many of our players to our fans through her words. I knew Michelle was special when I started to see her independently creating trust and relationships with the players.”
Josh Getzoff, the TV play-by-play broadcaster for SportsNet Pittsburgh, has also had the opportunity to see Crechiolo shine in her position.
“She’s naturally friendly,” Getzoff said. “Very early on, I saw that Michelle was able to forge really great relationships with the players. She was able to do interviews and get answers in those interviews that a lot of other people maybe wouldn’t be able to get because of the relationships she’s cultivated.”
All of Crechiolo’s hard work paid off when she made history last season as the first woman in Pittsburgh sports history to do color commentary on a broadcast of a game.
Previously, Crechiolo had done color commentary during live streams of intrasquad scrimmages at prospect development camps. But on Jan. 8, 2024, she stepped in for former NHL player and longtime radio color commentator Phil Bourque, who was out due to illness.
“That was surreal,” Crechiolo said. “The first thing I thought about was what my younger self would have made of it. The fact that (playing hockey) led to being part of an NHL broadcast for the Penguins – I couldn’t wrap my head around it.”
Getting this opportunity felt like an affirmation that all her efforts had been noticed by her peers, she said. Crechiolo has since done color commentary for several more games as well.
“You’re just hoping that you don’t mess it up so terribly that you don’t get another chance, but fortunately, that was not the case. I was able to build on it from there,” Crechiolo said.
The Penguins players have been supportive and thrilled that Crechiolo has gotten this opportunity. Whenever she is heading onto a broadcast, they give her interesting tidbits to share on the air.
“It’s at the point where Sid will give me something to use on every broadcast,” Crechiolo said. “It’s become somewhat of a tradition that I feel like I forced him into, but he’s humored me. What’s also been great is that he’s scored a number of times while I’ve been in the booth, and they’ve won a majority of those games. So with this being an extremely superstitious team, that definitely works in my favor.”
Despite the success she’s had in color commentary, Crechiolo wants to continue on with her current role as team reporter.
“I absolutely love what I’m doing now and want to continue it as long as possible,” Crechiolo said.
Sports journalism has always been a male-dominated field, but that never deterred Crechiolo.
“Being a woman in sports can be intimidating and overwhelming. You do need to have a certain level of confidence and belief in yourself,” Crechiolo said. “But I’ve been so fortunate to work for an organization like the Penguins, who have been such a pioneer when it comes to trusting and empowering women with different opportunities. They have done that for me since Day 1, and I am endlessly grateful.”
In recent years, the professional sports industry has seen an increase in women coming into sports journalism, and Crechiolo loves to see it.
“There truly cannot be enough women working in sports, watching sports, loving sports,” Crechiolo said. “I get emotional thinking about how much hockey in particular has given me, and I want that to be the case for all women and girls who are passionate about sports and want to be part of the industry in some way. We have come a long way in that regard, but there’s still a long way to go.”
