Ron Kroichick of The San Francisco Chronicle won first place in the Division A explanatory category of the 2025 Associated Press Sports Editors contest.
Kroichick’s winning entry dove into artificial intelligence in the sports world. From the Golden State Warriors and a Danville youth soccer club to Cal football, the NFL and the National Women’s Soccer League, Kroichick made clear that AI is making an unmistakable impact on the games people play and watch.
APSE contest winners will be honored at the 2026 APSE Summer Conference banquet July 18 at the Crystal Gateway Marriott in Arlington, Va. Registration for the conference is open; you can register right here.
Kroichick will receive a first-place plaque. The second- through 10th-place finishers will receive frame-worthy certificates.
Sports editors submitted 49 entries in the Division A explanatory category. Contest chair Perryn Keys and APSE officers Paul Barrett, Erik Hall and Tony Maluso prepared the entries.
Contest results: Digital, print and podcasts | Writing and photography
Judges convened in late February, in person at the APSE Winter Conference in Las Vegas and remotely around the nation, to select the top entrants. The committee determined 10 finalists, with each judge ranking the entries in order from 1 to 10. The final 10 were given to a second judging group in late February and March, ranking the entries from Nos. 1 to 10 in the same fashion.
The final rankings are determined by tallying the ballots.
The top 10 are listed, with first-place votes in parentheses, along with links to the winning entries.
The contest is open to APSE members. Click here to join.
1. Ron Kroichick, The San Francisco Chronicle (1)
2. Zak Keefer, The Athletic (2)
3. Lorenzo Reyes, USA TODAY Sports
T4. Eric Branch and Noah Furtado, The San Francisco Chronicle
T4. Jeff Seidel, Detroit Free Press (1)
6. Mark Schlabach, ESPN.com (1)
7. Ben Goessling, The Minnesota Star Tribune
8. Ryan S. Clark, ESPN.com (1)
9. Andrew Mahoney, The Boston Globe
10. Scott Lauber, The Philadelphia Inquirer
