Kevin Allen

Kevin Allen wrote his first NHL story in the last 1970s, and served as USA TODAY’s sole hockey writer from 1986-2020. In that period, he covered nine Winter Olympics, 32 Stanley Cup Finals and almost 800 NHL playoff games. In 2013, he received the Lester Patrick Award for contributions to hockey in the United States. In 2014, he was honored by Hockey Hall of Fame with the Elmer Ferguson Award.  In his career, he has covered multiple Super Bowls, World Series, NBA Finals, NCAA basketball tournaments and NASCAR races. His list of interview subjects have included a wide variety of sports figures, political figures and celebrities, everyone from Michael Jordan to Charles Barkley to Al Gore and Jimmy Carter and actors Michael J. Fox, Tim Robbins and Jon Hamm. He has written more than 20 sports books, including ‘Why is the Stanley Cup in Mario Lemieux’s Pool’ and ‘Star Spangled Hockey, a history of hockey in United States.’ He has written as-told-to books with Brett Hull, Jeremy Roenick, Darren McCarty and Chris Chelios. He has book coming out next fall with Detroit Tigers baseball legend Willie Horton. Currently, he is Editor-in-Chief of Detroit Hockey Now and writes national columns for hockeybuzz.