The resilience of entrepreneurs in times of crisis depends on mobilizing resources from others. Nevertheless, prior research on the role of entrepreneurial networks in an entrepreneur’s crisis response is limited. While an emerging research stream on entrepreneurial network agency made substantial strides in explaining the active role of entrepreneurs in network evolution, it remained relatively silent on when and why entrepreneurs activate different parts of their network. The current study investigates who entrepreneurs call when facing an economic threat. The study applies a bricolage and effectuation lens to develop hypotheses on entrepreneurial network activation in times of crisis. The results of a pre-registered randomized experiment in the COVID-19 context conducted with 122 entrepreneurs from the USA show that, contrary to prior expectations, entrepreneurs activate more-closed networks involving strong ties between network actors in a crisis. Additionally, higher-status entrepreneurs activate contacts to serve their own goals (instrumental networking) when facing an economic threat while, counter-intuitively, lower-status entrepreneurs, in such situations, more likely network to support others. The study discusses the implications of these findings for theory on crisis response among entrepreneurs and entrepreneurial networking.