TAMPA, Fla. _ Before she became one of the most well-known women in sports broadcasting, Erin Andrews got a crash course in hockey reporting from the unlikeliest of mentors.
Looking for her first long-term gig after graduating from the University of Florida in 2000, Andrews landed with the Lightning as a rink-side reporter in September 2001 at 22.
But she didn't know anything about hockey. Growing up in the Tampa Bay area, she went to a Lightning game here and there, but she was fuzzy on the difference between a power play and a penalty kill. She crammed the day before her interview with a copy of "Hockey for Dummies" bought at a Barnes & Noble.
Andrews had another reason to be nervous. The Lightning weren't in their best state, having recently hired John Tortorella as coach to replace fired Steve Ludzik.
A reporter who knew nothing about the NHL wasn't exactly the person Tortorella wanted around his team.
"I had heard through the grapevine (Tortorella) wasn't really too thrilled about getting a young female sideline reporter fresh out of school. I mean, he was working with one of the worst teams in the league," Andrews said. "It had been awful, and he was trying to get them to pay attention and didn't want any distractions."
But avoiding Tortorella wasn't an option. She was intimidated by him and the explosive personality many knew him to have, but she had a job to do.
"I walked up to him, and I just said, 'Hi, I'm Erin Andrews. I'm gonna be really honest with you. I don't know anything about the NHL. I am a huge sports fan. All I kind of really know about is the Florida Gators because I just graduated college, but I'm willing to listen and I'm willing to learn.' "
A couple of months after she started, Andrews asked about how defenseman Nolan Pratt had made an impact on the team given the recent stretch of good games it had been playing.
Tortorella stopped the media scrum and told her it was the first good question he'd heard all day. She had proven herself to him.
That job helped spark a career that led Andrews to bigger opportunities at places including Turner Sports and ESPN. It also brought her back to Tampa in 2004 to cover the Lightning on the biggest stage in hockey: the playoffs.
"(The Lightning) put me on the map," said Andrews, now a sideline reporter for Fox's NFL broadcasts. "And if you think about it, it could have been just a really rough go for me. You know, it's a bunch of professional athletes and (a professional) organization, and (yet) they were so welcoming and wonderful to me."
None more so than Tortorella.
