Shelly Stallsmith of the York (Pa.) Daily Record won first place in the Division D long feature category of the 2025 Associated Press Sports Editors contest.
Stallsmith’s winning entry detailed how a chance meeting was the catalyst for a remarkable bond that formed between a Penn State volleyball player, Marin Collins, and a York (Pa.) Township girl named Maren Brant, who at 3 years old had been diagnosed with Langerhans cell histiocytosis (LCH), a rare cancer-like disease, after a tumor was found in her jaw. The Penn State volleyball team later “adopted” Maren, creating a unique relationship among Collins – who grew up an only child – and Brant’s family.
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.
Stallsmith will receive a first-place plaque. The second- through 10th-place finishers will receive frame-worthy certificates.
Sports editors submitted 62 entries in the Division D long feature 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. Shelly Stallsmith, York (Pa.) Daily Record (3)
2. Matt Schuckman, Muddy River Sports (1)
3. Chase Goodbread, The Tuscaloosa News
T4. Paul Witwer, San Angelo Standard-Times (1)
T4. Jonathan Hull, Wichita Falls Times-Record News
6. Nathan Giese, Lubbock Avalanche-Journal
7. Tim Dumas, MetroWest Daily News (1)
T8. Adam Cole, Montgomery Advertiser
T8. Don Williams, Lubbock Avalanche-Journal
10. Jane Allison Havsy, Daily Record (Rockaway, N.J.)
