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Noreen Gillespie named AP’s deputy sports editor

Noreen Gillespie poses for a photo, Thursday, Jan. 23, 2014, in Chicago. Gillespie, a deputy regional editor for The Associated Press who helps oversee news coverage of 14 states and was a key editor at the past two Olympics, has been appointed deputy sports editor for the news agency. Gillespie, currently based in Chicago at the AP's Central Regional Desk, will be based in New York and will report to Global Sports Editor Michael Giarrusso, who announced the promotion Thursday. (AP Photo/Kiichiro Sato)

Noreen Gillespie

NEW YORK (AP) — Noreen Gillespie, a deputy regional editor for The Associated Press who helps oversee news coverage of 14 states and was a key editor at the past two Olympics, has been appointed deputy sports editor for the news agency.

AP Deputy Sports Editor Noreen Gillespie (AP Photo/Kiichiro Sato)

Gillespie, currently based in Chicago at the AP’s Central Regional Desk, will be based in New York and will report to Global Sports Editor Michael Giarrusso, who announced the promotion Thursday.

She will work with four regional sports editors in the United States and International Sports Editor Simon Haydon to oversee more than 100 sports journalists around the globe, handling spot coverage of games, investigative reporting and planning for events such as the Super Bowl, World Cup and Olympics.

“Noreen brings creativity and a strong sense of storytelling in all formats. She has a history of developing new operations so AP journalists can be successful,” Giarrusso said. “She has a history of working well with managers across all formats, and she’ll have an immediate positive impact on our sports content across the globe.”

Giarrusso also announced that Tim Sullivan, the AP’s East Regional sports editor, would be taking on added responsibilities, overseeing the editing and filing operations of the sports desk in New York.

“Tim will continue to lead sports coverage in the East, and he’ll add a focus on improving our editing operations and speed across the board,” Giarrusso said.

Sullivan joined the AP in 2010 after working as deputy sports editor of the New York Post from 2004-2010. He had previously held management roles in the sports departments of the St. Petersburg Times, Gainesville Sun and Florida Times-Union. He began his career as a sports writer at the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette in 1994, after graduating from Duquesne University.

Sullivan takes on the new duties immediately. Gillespie starts as deputy sports editor March 17.

Since 2009, Gillespie has been the deputy editor at the AP’s Central operations, which covers 14 states from Texas to Michigan and Minnesota. She led the region’s daily and long-term news report and directed multiformat teams on breaking stories such as the Fort Hood shootings in 2009 and the Moore, Okla., tornadoes in 2013. She has been an onsite editor in several hurricanes and worked for the AP at the Vancouver and London Olympics.

In 2008, she was part of the leadership of the AP’s first domestic regional desk, as assistant editor on the South Desk. During her time in Atlanta, she designed the desk’s breaking news filing structure and trained a team of text editors.

Gillespie, 34 and a native of Newtown, Conn., joined the AP in 2002 as a statehouse and education reporter in the Hartford bureau. She later worked as a supervisor and editor on the AP’s national desk in New York, and was awarded the AP’s internal Gramling Scholarship Award in 2005.

She holds a master’s degree in public administration from the Wagner School of Public Service at New York University, and an undergraduate degree in political science and sociology from Saint Mary’s College in Notre Dame, Ind.

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