Kyle Dawson of the Aiken Standard won first place in the Associated Press Sports Editors 2020 contest in Category D Game Story.

Dawson will be presented a first-place plaque at the 2021 APSE Summer Conference Banquet at the Flamingo Hotel in Las Vegas on Aug. 18.

Glenn Guilbeau of The Daily Advertiser finished second and} John Bednarowski of the Marietta Daily Journal was third.

A Game Story entry is judged based on reader interest, and quality of writing and thoroughness of reporting.

Sports editors in Category D submitted 34 stories. The contest is open to APSE members. 

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Contest chair and First Vice President Gary Potosky and fellow APSE officers President Lisa Wilson, Second Vice President Jorge Rojas and Third Vice President Steve Hemphill prepared the entries.

Because this year’s in-person APSE Winter Conference was canceled due to the pandemic, all judging was remote during three weeks in February. Each category had a set of judges examine all entries, choose a Top 10 as a group (in some cases, the ranking includes fewer or more than 10 entries), and each of those judges ranked the finalists individually. A second set of judges in each category then also ranked those finalists.

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 frameable certificates.

The top 10 is listed below with links to the winning entries, and voting results.

1. Kyle Dawson, Aiken Standard, 55 points, 4 first-place votes

2. Glenn Guilbeau, The Daily Advertiser, 43 points, 1 first-place vote

3. John Bednarowski, Marietta Daily Journal, 41 points, 1 first-place vote

4. Chris Kwiecinski, The Spectrum & Daily News, 35 points

T5. Tim Buckley, The Daily Advertiser, 33 points

T5. Tyler Kraft, The Manhattan Mercury, 33 points

7. Brett Vito, Denton Record-Chronicle, 27 points

8. Monica Holland, The Fayetteville Observer, 24 points

9. Ryan Black, The Manhattan Mercury, 23 points

10. Adam Hunsucker, The News-Star, 16 points

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