Rachel Roberts of the Idaho Statesman won first place in the 2022 Associated Press Sports Editors contest in the Division D Explanatory Writing category for her article on how the different basketballs used in the college game were affecting Boise State.

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.          

Michael Lycklama of the Idaho Statesman was second and Dennis Knight of the Savannah Morning News took third.      

Roberts will receive a plaque. The second- through 10th-place finishers will receive frameable certificates.                                                                                               

Sports editors in Division D submitted 35 entries in Explanatory. 

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. 

Explanatory stories include reporting on trends, issues, and original ideas that sheds new light on issues and personalities in the news. They go beyond the “yesterday” of the breaking news story.

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

  1. Rachel Roberts, Idaho Statesman, 59 points (5 first-place votes)
  2. Michael Lycklama, Idaho Statesman, 41 points
  3. Dennis Knight, Savannah Morning News, 37 points 
  4. James Crabtree-Hannigan, Asheville Citizen Times, 35 points (1 first-place vote)
  5. Nick Kelly, The Tuscaloosa News, 34 points
  6. Thomas Ashworth, Marietta Daily Journal, 31 points
  7. John Canzano, JohnCanzano.com, 27 points
  8. Jane Allison Havsy, Daily Record (Rockaway, N.J.), 24 points
  9. (tie) Christian Eby, The Carlisle Sentinel, 21 points

9. (tie) David Eckert, Hattiesburg American 21 points