Andrew Carter of the News & Observer in Raleigh, N.C., won first place in the Associated Press Sports Editors 2021 contest in the Division B Explanatory category for his article on the N.C. State baseball team’s sudden exit from the College World Series.

Carter will be presented a first-place plaque at the 2022 APSE Summer Conference banquet at The Alexander Hotel in Indianapolis on June 18. Click here to register for the conference.                 

Julie Jag of the Salt Lake Tribune finished second, and Ryan Wood of the Green Bay Press-Gazette took third.

Sports editors in Division B submitted 61 entries in Explanatory. 

Contest chair Jorge Rojas and fellow APSE officers Gary Potosky, Naila-Jean Meyers and Ed Reed prepared the entries. The contest is open to APSE members.

Click here to join.

In February, judges at the APSE Winter Conference in Lake Buena Vista, Fla., selected a top 10, with each judge ranking the entries in order from 1 to 10 on a separate ballot. 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. 

The 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.

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. Andrew Carter, News & Observer (Raleigh, N.C.), 46 points (3 first-place votes)

2. Julie Jag, Salt Lake Tribune, 44 points (1 first-place vote)

3. Ryan Wood, Green Bay Press-Gazette, 40 points (2 first-place votes)

T4. Charlie Goldsmith, The Cincinnati Enquirer, 34 points

T4. Jason Wolf, The Buffalo News, 34 points

T4. Joey Kaufman, The Columbus (Ohio) Dispatch, 34 points

7. Jon Nyatawa, Omaha World-Herald, 29 points

8. Ben Gotz, Las Vegas Review-Journal, 27 points

9. Zach Dean, Daytona Beach News-Journal, 25 points

10. Dana Hunsinger Benbow, IndyStar (Indianapolis), 17 points

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