Pierce honored by Wild, colleagues with press box memorial

Jessi Pierce would always have a blanket to combat the cold in the press box at Grand Casino Arena while covering the Minnesota Wild. 

So it was fitting two blankets were placed in her press box seat in memory of the popular journalist Thursday, prior to Minnesota’s 5-2 win against the Vancouver Canucks. 

Pierce, 37, was killed in a house fire along with her three children and family dog on the morning of March 21. Her husband and father of the three children, Mike Hinrichs, was away on business.  

“The Wild had the framed photo of her and the flowers and then I added a blanket as did another reporter,” Sarah McLellan of The Minnesota Star Tribune told NHL.com on Friday. “She would bring a blanket and have a blanket draped over her lap when she would watch games in the press box because it was chilly. So, we thought it was a fitting touch to add that.

“Then throughout the game when we get the stats sheets passed out, they were still being passed out at her seat and another bouquet of flowers was dropped off, and there was a hot dog placed there too, because that was a snack for her. During the game she would have a hot dog.” 

McLellan and Michael Russo, who writes for The Athletic and is a contributor on KFAN1003 radio and co-hosts the Talk North podcast, had pins created to honor Pierce and her three children and handed them out at the game Thursday. “And I added the pin that we had created,” McLellan said. “I affixed it to one of the blankets.”

Pierce was the Wild reporter for NHL.com for the past 10 seasons, attending every home game. Along with the memorial at her seat in the press box, the Wild also held a moment of silence for Pierce and her three children with a tribute on the scoreboard. 

The game against the Canucks was the first home game for the Wild since the news of her death became public. 

“Jessi used to watch games with a blanket around her and the other thing she would do during a game is she would go down to the alumni room and get a hot dog. Every game Jessi did this,” Russo said. “The Wild have a really cool alumni room that anybody who has ever played in the NHL can go to during games. We would go down there and get a hot dog and one of her friends put a hot dog in her seat last night. I think we’ll probably continue that tradition as well, because it was a big part with Jessi.”

McLellan’s younger sister Kelli came up with the design for the pin with three hockey sticks for Pierce’s three children, Hudson, Cayden and Avery, along with a microphone to honor her work as a broadcaster. 

“I told my sister we had this idea and I asked her if she could help me come up with something and she did. She just put it together,” McLellan said. “We passed them out at the game last night to the people that Jessi worked with at the arena; the arena staff and personnel and other reporters, some people that we would come in contact with. We wore them last night at the game.” 

A graduate of Iowa State University, Pierce’s work appeared in numerous publications, including USA Hockey, the Minnesota Hockey Journal, Massachusetts Hockey, The Athletic and the B1G Ice Hockey blog, which covered Big Ten ice hockey. 

She was also a co-host on the “Bardown Beauties” podcast about the Wild and appeared on a Minnesota Vikings podcast.

“Another thing that is incredible is the number of texts I’ve gotten from opposing players and coaches,” Russo said. “In this shrinking media market where so many out-of-town writers don’t travel, a lot of times Jessi would be one of the only people with the opposing coach after the game or in the opposing locker room gathering quotes. 

“So, she had relationship with all these people that were affected that we didn’t even know that knew her. They know her almost better than us, because we would go to the home room and she was going to the visitors’ room. She just was really special.”

Russo said the Wild have been extremely supportive to all the media during this difficult time. Currently the team is working on setting up something permanent in the Grand Casino Arena to pay tribute to Pierce. 

“The one thing about Jessi is she loved the sport and was such a proponent of the sport, so I think that even fans that didn’t know her, were attracted to her because of that,” Russo said. “They realized how genuine she was. Any time the phone rang and asked her to MC something or do something with a fundraiser or charity she would. She was incredible.”