Jackie "Mac" MacMullan Boyle (born October 7, 1960) is a retired American freelance newspaper
sportswriter
Sports journalism is a form of writing that reports on matters pertaining to sporting topics and competitions. Sports journalism started in the early 1800s when it was targeted to the social elite and transitioned into an integral part of the n ...
and
NBA columnist for the sports website
ESPN.com
ESPN.com is the official website of ESPN. It is owned by ESPN Internet Ventures, a division of ESPN Inc.
History
Since launching in April 1995 as ESPNET.SportsZone.com (ESPNET SportsZone), the website has developed numerous sections including ...
. She retired from ESPN on August 31, 2021.
She attended Westwood High School in
Westwood, Massachusetts and was coached by
Kathy Delaney-Smith. MacMullan started her sports journalism career at the age fifteen in order to write only about her high school's girl teams for their local newspaper.
She is a graduate of the
University of New Hampshire
The University of New Hampshire (UNH) is a public land-grant research university with its main campus in Durham, New Hampshire. It was founded and incorporated in 1866 as a land grant college in Hanover in connection with Dartmouth College, m ...
, where she played Division I basketball for the Wildcats.
In 1982, MacMullan joined the
Boston Globe
''The Boston Globe'' is an American daily newspaper founded and based in Boston, Massachusetts. The newspaper has won a total of 27 Pulitzer Prizes, and has a total circulation of close to 300,000 print and digital subscribers. ''The Boston Glob ...
as a news department intern.
She was a columnist and associate editor of the Boston Globe until she took a buyout from the paper in March 2008. From 1995 to 2000 she covered the NBA as a senior writer for
Sports Illustrated
''Sports Illustrated'' (''SI'') is an American sports magazine first published in August 1954. Founded by Stuart Scheftel, it was the first magazine with circulation over one million to win the National Magazine Award for General Excellence twi ...
.
In 1999, MacMullan collaborated with
Larry Bird
Larry Joe Bird (born December 7, 1956) is an American former professional basketball player, coach, and executive in the National Basketball Association (NBA). Nicknamed "the Hick from French Lick" and "Larry Legend", Bird is widely regarded a ...
on his autobiography ''Bird Watching: on Playing and Coaching the Game I Love''. She released ''Geno: In Pursuit of Perfection'' with
Geno Auriemma
Luigi "Geno" Auriemma (born March 23, 1954) is an Italian-born American college basketball coach and, since 1985, the head coach of the University of Connecticut Connecticut Huskies women's basketball, Huskies women's basketball team. , he has le ...
in 2006, and wrote the New York Times best seller "When the Game Was Ours" with Magic Johnson and Larry Bird in 2009.
In 2011 MacMullan collaborated with NBA superstar
Shaquille O'Neal to write his autobiography titled ''Shaq Uncut: My Story''.
MacMullan has been a correspondent for several cable television networks including
ESPN
ESPN (originally an initialism for Entertainment and Sports Programming Network) is an American international basic cable sports channel owned by ESPN Inc., owned jointly by The Walt Disney Company (80%) and Hearst Communications (20%). Th ...
,
CNNSI, and
NESN
New England Sports Network, popularly known as NESN , is an American regional sports cable and satellite television network owned by a joint venture of Fenway Sports Group (which owns a controlling 80% interest, and is the owner of Boston Red So ...
, as well as
WHDH-TV
WHDH (channel 7) is an independent television station in Boston, Massachusetts, United States. It is owned by Sunbeam Television alongside Cambridge-licensed CW affiliate WLVI (channel 56). WHDH and WLVI share studios at Bulfinch Place (nea ...
in Boston. She is a regular panelist on the ESPN program ''
Around the Horn
''Around the Horn'' (''ATH'') is an American sports roundtable discussion show, conducted in the style of a panel game, produced by ESPN. The show premiered on November 4, 2002, as a replacement for ''Unscripted with Chris Connelly'', and has ...
''. She has also co-hosted episodes of the network's
Pardon the Interruption
''Pardon the Interruption'' (abbreviated ''PTI'') is an American sports talk television show that airs weekdays on various ESPN TV channels. It is hosted by Tony Kornheiser and Michael Wilbon, who discuss, and frequently argue over, the top stor ...
.
In response to MacMullan's departure from the Globe, she had this to say in an email to the blog site ''Boston Sports Media Watch'':
On May 12, 2010, MacMullan and longtime Cleveland Cavaliers radio play-by-play announcer
Joe Tait
Joseph Tait (May 15, 1937 – March 10, 2021) was an American sports broadcaster who was the play-by-play announcer on radio for the Cleveland Cavaliers of the National Basketball Association (NBA) and both TV and radio for the Cleveland India ...
received the
Curt Gowdy Media Award
The Curt Gowdy Media Award is an annual award given by the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame to outstanding basketball writers and broadcasters. It is named for American sportscaster Curt Gowdy, who was the Hall of Fame's president for ...
from the
Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame.
The awards are presented annually to members of the print and electronic media who made a significant contribution to the game of basketball. MacMullan was the first woman to receive the honor in its 21-year history.
On May 4, 2013, in an article for ESPN, MacMullan took a controversial stance among members of the Boston media when she suggested that the
Boston Celtics should part ways with team captain
Paul Pierce
Paul Anthony Pierce (born October 13, 1977) is an American former professional basketball player. He played 19 seasons in the National Basketball Association (NBA), predominantly with the Boston Celtics. He was most recently an analyst on ESPN ...
.
In 2018, MacMullan was a co-editor with
Rafe Bartholomew and
Dan Klores for the oral history book “Basketball: A Love Story”, based on the ESPN documentary series of the same name.
In February 2019 MacMullan was awarded the
PEN/ESPN Lifetime Achievement Award for Literary Sports Writing.
In September 2020, MacMullan was hired by
The Ringer to host a podcast about the NBA and appear on other podcasts on the site. In March 2022 she unveiled her podcast with The Ringer entitled Icons Club, featuring various NBA icons.
MacMullan announced her retirement from ESPN effective Aug. 31, 2021.
References
External links
Archive of MacMullan's column at the Boston Globe
{{DEFAULTSORT:MacMullan, Jackie
1960 births
American newspaper reporters and correspondents
American women non-fiction writers
American women sportswriters
Living people
National Basketball Association broadcasters
People from Manhasset, New York
People from Westwood, Massachusetts
Sportswriters from Massachusetts
Sportswriters from New York (state)
The Boston Globe people
University of New Hampshire alumni
20th-century American women writers
20th-century American journalists
21st-century American women writers
21st-century American journalists