Baptism by fire for NESN's Cervasio

When Tina Cervasio came to Boston last year to be a Red Sox reporter for NESN, she had to jump right in.

"My first game was the exhibition in Philadelphia, and the next day was Opening Day [in Texas]," said Cervasio. "So I was introducing myself to players as they were hitting walkoff homers.

"I had been reading up on all the players, but I had to figure out what my role with the broadcasts was, too," added Cervasio, who has separate producers for the pregame, game, and postgame shows she works on.

"That, and the schedule, took some getting used to."

Cervasio has the same schedule as the players, and covers every game, home and away.

"And even if ESPN or Fox has the game, I'm always there, because if there's breaking news, I have to be there," she said.

Cervasio was curious what Red Sox Nation thought about her, so she went to blogs. It wasn't pleasant, Cervasio said of the criticism she received about everything -- from what she said to what she wore. "I was devastated."

So her father and husband staged a sort of intervention and banned her from reading the blogs.

Colleague Hazel Mae had a warning for Cervasio, too.

"She yelled at me, and said, 'Do not listen to what anybody says,' " Cervasio said. "She said she went through the same thing. She said block it out and be yourself and if they don't like you, that's their problem."

Cervasio has steered clear of online opinions since last June.

"You know what?" she said. "I have bosses and those are the only people I listen to."

One of those bosses is NESN vice president of programming, Joel Feld, who hired her away from WCBS in New York.

"Her primary position is to report and give insight from conversations she's had with players before the game," said Feld, who has eliminated the "chit chat" sessions with fans that used to be featured. "We don't want to interrupt the flow of the game."

Asked if it gave him any pause to hire a New Yorker, Feld said, "No, I think a good reporter is a good reporter. I was looking for the best reporter I could find, and Tina was by far the best choice."

Cervasio, 32, grew up in Nutley, N.J., and her late grandparents were diehard Yankees fans. But her sport of choice was football, because her father, a Cornell graduate, was an avid college football fan and drove the family to Big Red games. She went to some Mets and Yankees games, then became an Orioles fan when she attended the University of Maryland.

"But I'm really not even a Red Sox fan now, I'm just a baseball fan," she said. "It's hard to be a fan of one team, just with free agency and the way the players move around."

After graduating, she was sports editor for three small local papers in New Jersey. "Then, the next year I started working at NewSport television in Long Island as a low-level producer," she said. She covered arena football for ESPN and worked for Major League Baseball production before joining WCBS in 2004 as a weekend morning sports anchor and reporter.

Then it was on to Boston.

"I knew NESN's reputation, and it's really not a regional network, with Red Sox fans all over the country, and all these satellites," she said. "And I knew that the Red Sox baseball broadcasts were outstanding. So when this opportunity came up, I wanted to go after it."

NESN will show both Red Sox spring training games tomorrow and Sunday at 1 p.m. The network also will air a special edition of "Red Sox Spring Break" Monday at 7 p.m. that will show the results of the online poll of fans' top nine moments in Red Sox history. Tom Caron will host, with former Globe columnist Leigh Montville the guest . . . Amid all the Sox and Bruins' coverage, NESN has to squeeze in the Hockey East championships. The station will carry the semifinals tonight -- UNH vs. UMass at 5, and BC vs. BU at 8. Tomorrow NESN will cede live coverage of the championship game at 7 p.m. to an alternate channel, such as CN8 (check NESN.com for a listing of all alternate channels). NESN will show the championship game on tape delay at 10:20 p.m., after the Bruins-Rangers game . . . Celtics captain Paul Pierce will host his third installment of "Sports Tonight" on FSN New England Thursday at 6:30 p.m. He'll be joined by teammate Delonte West.

Susan Bickelhaupt can be reached at bickelhaupt@globe.com.