Nate Mink of Syracuse.com/The Post-Standard won first place in The Associated Press Sports Editors 2019 contest in Feature Story in the C Division.
Andrew John of The Desert Sun (Palm Springs, Calif.) finished second and Ryan Wood of Green Bay Post-Gazette took third.
Mink will be presented a first-place plaque at the 2020 APSE Summer Conference Banquet at The Alexander Hotel in Indianapolis on June 27.
Sports editors in the C Division submitted 83 features entries. The contest is open to APSE members. Click here to join.
Contest chair Lisa Wilson and fellow APSE officers Todd M. Adams, Gary Potosky and Dan Spears prepared the entries.
In February, preliminary judges at the APSE Winter Conference in St. Petersburg, Fla., and off-site around the country, selected a top 10, with each judge ranking the entries in order from 1 to 10 on a separate ballot. Entries were given 10 points for a first-place vote, nine points for second and so on down to one point for a 10th-place vote. The final 10 were given to a second judging group, which ranked the entries 1-10 in the same fashion.
The winner and final rankings are determined by tallying the ballots.
The winner in each category will receive a plaque at the summer conference. The second- through 10th-place finishers will receive certificates.
Judging in feature stories was based on human interest, reader interest, quality of writing and thoroughness of reporting.
The top 10 is listed below with links to the winning entries.
1. Nate Mink, Syracuse.com/The Post-Standard, 56 points, four first-place votes
2. Andrew John, The Desert Sun (Palm Springs, Calif.), 45 points, one first-place votes
3. Ryan Wood, Green Bay Press-Gazette, 43 points, one first-place vote
4. Ben Breiner, The State (Columbia S.C.), 37 points
5. Peter Scamardo, Corpus Christi Caller Times, 34 points
6. Nick Alvarez, The News-Press (Fort Myers, Fla.), 31 points
7. Bob Gillespie, The State (Columbia S.C.), 27 points
8. Ben Portnoy, The Dispatch (Columbus. Miss.), 21 points
T-9. Lee Horton, Sun Journal (Lewiston, Maine), 18 points
T-9. Joey LoMonaco, The Free Lance-Star (Fredericksburg, Va.), 18 points
