Jason Munz of The Commercial Appeal in Memphis, Tenn., won first place in the 2022 Associated Press Sports Editors contest in the Division C Beat Writing category for his coverage of University of Memphis men’s basketball.
APSE contest winners will be honored at the 2023 APSE Summer Conference banquet at the Flamingo Hotel in Las Vegas on July 12. Click here to register for the conference, which begins on July 9 and will celebrate the 50th anniversary of the founding of APSE.
Taylor Eldridge of The Wichita Eagle was second for his Wichita State coverage, and Michael Niziolek was third for his Virginia Tech coverage for The Roanoke Times.
Munz will receive a plaque. The second- through 10th-place finishers will receive frameable certificates.
Sports editors in Division C submitted 40 Beat Writing entries.
Contest chair Naila-Jean Meyers and fellow APSE officers Jorge Rojas, Dan Spears and Ed Reed prepared the entries. The contest is open to APSE members. Click here to join.
Contest results: Sections, digital, video | Writing and photography
In February, judges at the APSE Winter Conference in Lake Buena Vista, Fla., and remote judges around the country selected a top 10, with each judge ranking the entries in order from 1 to 10. 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.
Beat writing is a collection of five pieces by a single author that shows authoritative, newsy and innovative coverage of a beat. Each writer was required to submit one breaking news story, one event or game coverage story and one enterprise story. The final two pieces were left to the writer’s discretion and could include multimedia presentations.
The top 10 is listed below with voting results and links to the winning entries.
- Jason Munz, The Commercial Appeal (Memphis, Tenn.), Memphis men’s basketball 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5, 57 points (3 first-place votes)
- Taylor Eldridge, The Wichita Eagle, Wichita State athletics 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5, 47 points (1 first-place vote)
- Michael Niziolek, The Roanoke Times, Virginia Tech football 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5, 42 points
- Nick Suss, Clarion Ledger (Jackson, Miss.), University of Mississippi athletics 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5, 40 points (1 first-place vote)
- Ben Portnoy, The State (Columbia, S.C.), South Carolina football 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5, 37 points
- Drew Hill, The Daily Memphian, Memphis Grizzlies 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5, 30 points
- Danielle Allentuck, The Gazette (Colorado Springs), Colorado Rockies 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5, 29 points (1 first-place vote)
- Alex Martin, The News-Press (Fort Myers, Fla.), high school sports 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5, 21 points
- Brent C. Wagner, Lincoln Journal Star, Nebraska volleyball 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5, 16 points
- Larry Bohannan, The Desert Sun (Palm Springs, Calif.), golf 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5, 11 points
