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An Interview with a former Penguins.com Staff Writer

by Patrick Hoffman on 06/17/09 at 03:25 PM ET
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This interview could not have come at a better time - with the Pittsburgh Penguins celebrating their first Stanley Cup since 1992, I was lucky to be able to interview an intern of theirs who did the staff writing for the team’s web site - Deborah Francisco.

Ms. Francisco has a terrific hockey-writing background and shares that, along with how she got into the game, her favorite team/player, the future of online hockey media, and more with us here at Kukla’s Korner.

Continue below to check out what Deb is all about.

PH: How did you first get into hockey?
DF: I used to hate hockey. I grew up in a small hockey town in the mountains of Northern New Mexico and my two older brothers used to play hockey, which meant I got dragged along to their early morning practices and games at the local outdoor rink. It wasn’t until I was about 12 years old when my brothers made me watch an Avalanche game on TV and taught me the rules. Since then I have been infatuated with the game.

PH: Growing up, who was your favorite team and player? Why?
DF: The Avalanche has always been my family’s team of choice in part because they were the closes NHL team and in part because they were awesome. Once a year, my parents would drive us the six hours to Denver to see a game. The first game I attended was an Avalanche-Red Wings tilt back in the prime of that rivalry - it was awesome. My favorite player used to be a tie between Peter Forsberg and Rob Blake.

PH: At what point in your life did you know that you wanted to get involved in hockey as a member of the media?
DF: When I was 15-years-old, I started sending hockey stories to my local newspaper and they eventually hired me as a freelance sportswriter. I loved the thrill of journalism and I already had a passion for hockey, so when I realized I could combine the two as a career – that was it, I made up my mind to become a hockey writer.

PH: What outlets have you covered hockey for?
DF: I started at the Los Alamos Monitor covering high school hockey. During college, I was a new media intern with the New York Rangers. I have done little bits of writing and blogging for various outlets such as insdiehockey.com and MVN.com and most recently, I interned as a staff writer for the Pittsburgh Penguins.

PH: Describe your most recent gig as staff writer for Penguins.com for us.
DF: Where do I begin? It was awesome. I was responsible for live-blogging all home games and playoff games for the website. I covered all of the community relations gigs the team did, I wrote side bar stories after home games and I also wrote feature stories for every game day program. The perks included getting to watch all of the practices and getting to watch games from the press box… oh yeah, and hoisting the Stanley Cup at the victory parade on Monday.

PH: What are you trying to bring hockey fans that read your work on the site?
DF: When I used to follow the Avs as a kid, I read everything I could get my hands on. I wanted to know every detail about every game and player. Naturally, as a hockey writer now, I want to give the fans what they want. I like to show them what the players are like off the ice, because that’s what I always wanted to know about when I was younger. I always get the best feedback on human-interest stories and those are my favorite stories to write.

PH: What other hockey outlets are you currently contributing to?
DF: Currently, I am enjoying the off-season but I occasionally post on my personal blog NHLgirl.com.

PH: What do you think the future of hockey coverage on the Internet is? How do you plan to be a part of it?
DB: It’s hard to admit, but newspapers are slowly dying out. I believe the teams in the NHL will eventually provide some of the best content on their own teams (the Penguins do this very well). I’m still not sure where bloggers will fit into the scheme of things because teams are hesitant to credential them.

PH: Any words of wisdom for Kukla’s Korner readers out there?
DB: Always triple check facts. More often than not, when I read blog posts online the facts are wrong or are slightly off. Perhaps this happens because there is no editor present to double check, so be your own harshest critic and triple check your work. Also, never rip off info from a source without giving credit to them.

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 Tags: Deborah+Francisco, Pittsburgh+Penguins,

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Patrick has a tremendous passion for hockey. Besides covering the Rangers and the NHL for Kukla’s Korner, you can also find Patrick’s work over at RLD Hockey, Rangers Tribune, and TheGoodPoint.com.

Prior to writing for the above mentioned outlets, you could find Patrick’s musings at hockey web sites/outlets such as TheHockeyNews.com, The Fourth Period, Spector’s Hockey, Hokeja Vestnesis, Blueshirt Bulletin, SNYRangersBlog.com and many more.

For questions, comments and hip checks, feel free to e-mail Patrick at .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address).

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