Goose's Gabs

And so my first year comes to a close. A year of covering football and basketball and baseball, track and tennis, softball and volleyball and wrestling. A year of bowling and rodeos and the occasional story about quidditch, disc golf or fishing.

I came to McAlester already a decent writer, but I had no idea how to really cover a daily beat. I learned how to do that this year, figuring out how to juggle multiple schools and sports, all of which had at least a somewhat legitimate reason to want coverage.

If I learned one lesson this year, it’s that you’ll never be able to please every single one of your readers, so there’s no point in trying. Instead, try to treat each story you do with professionalism, enthusiasm and rigor. If you can’t cover a team all that often, try to remember as much as you can about that team, so when you do return for a second story, it feels like a second story, not another first story.

Whenever I asked coaches at smaller schools if they were satisfied with how much coverage they got, for the most part they said yes. I’m the only sports writer at the McAlester News-Capital, there’s no way to cover every game and every team equally, and coaches seemed to understand that. Because I approached my small-school stories with the same care I did with McAlester High School, I think those coaches respected me. They knew that whatever degree of coverage I could provide, it would at least match my approach to MHS athletics in quality, if not in quantity.

Journalists need to develop sources to do their job — people who will from time to time share information with a reporter that he or she wouldn’t otherwise know. I don’t know how you do that on a government, science or crime beat, but in a sports beat, I think a lot of it comes down to following through on the promises you make (even if they’re fewer in number than they could be), and giving your best effort when it comes time to write.

Here’s what I wrote in my final week of Year 1.

Mays open their home to Sunbelt

Buffs’ Cumbie knows Sunbelt

Sunbelt, Day 5: Oklahoma Gold beats Blue

Sunbelt, Day 5: Texas too much for Canada

Arizona wins 2013 Jr. Sunbelt Championship

Three HRs power Texas past Tennessee

Akins, Miners beat Buffs baseball

Justus Sheffield says goodbye to Sunbelt

Wrapping up the 2013 Jr. Sunbelt

The 2012 Jr. Sunbelt Classic was just about over when I drove into McAlester a year ago. The 2013 Jr. Sunbelt Classic ends Wednesday night, and my second official year as a sports journalist starts one week from today.

Man, how the time flies. Here, then, is everything I wrote in the penultimate week of my Year 1.

Ex-Buff helps Murray State win first title

Tennessee prepares for Sunbelt title defense

NCAA shouldn’t ban Adderall

British Soccer Camp comes to McAlester

Jr. Sunbelt Classic, Day 1

Sunbelt, Day 1: Arizona walks off against Okla. Gold

Sunbelt, Day 1: Tennessee out-duels Missouri

Jr. Sunbelt Classic, Day 2

Sunbelt, Day 2: Tennessee outlasts Oklahoma Blue

Sunbelt, Day 2: Mississippi holds off Georgia

I’m on vacation this week, so no long intro. Here are the final articles I wrote before heading home for some much-needed R&R:

Eufaula Classic crossed the line

McAlester United wraps season

Six Buffs named All-District

Eagle Hill “Fun Day” set for June 1

Buffs and Lady Buffs organize donations

Buffs prepare for summer football schedule

Cowboy Caravan fundraiser held in Krebs

Kelbie Moon helps South win at Eastern

Five make junior high rodeo championship

This has been one of the stranger weekends I’ve faced since moving out to McAlester. It started Saturday night, when I watched a football game get so out of hand the referees ran away and the game had ended midway through the third quarter and without a winner. The strangeness continued Sunday, when the weather started turning bad all over Oklahoma and I quickly educated myself on exactly what to do if a tornado hit McAlester (other than poop myself).

I thought it had passed when I woke up Monday morning, but instead the weather somehow got even worse than it had been the day before. But for all the chaos going on elsewhere in the state, McAlester seems to have escaped with nothing more than a couple inches of rain.

When I looked outside Monday night, I simultaneously saw the sun setting hazily behind thick yellow clouds in the west, streaks of lightning and the grey-green clouds of a heavy thunderstorm to the east, and an actual rainbow shooting into the sky from the south.

If that doesn’t characterize the last 48 hours, I don’t know what will. Here’s what I wrote this week.

3 locals make, skip OHS Meet of Champions

Stuart’s Bowen leaving for Coleman

Dance sends Katie Sams to UCO

Rain cancels SEOBCA All-Star game

Pitt 8 announces All-Conference teams

Buff soccer player makes Olympic program

Dugout Club still seeking Sunbelt hosts

Box Score: Lake Eufaula Classic

Fighting KOs Eufaula Classic in third

And so it ends. McAlester’s track and tennis teams finished their respective state competitions Saturday, marking the end of the 2012-13 high school sports year.

I’m sure I’ll write a few more stories on high school athletes throughout the summer, but the routine I developed throughout the year to stay on top of 12 schools’ worth of teams and players won’t be necessary again until school starts up in August.

The end of the school year comes with mixed emotions. Last summer’s work days tended to both start and end earlier, so in theory that means it’ll be easier to find time to exercise and perhaps even socialize a bit.

But I also really like covering high school games, and I’m definitely going to miss having so many potential stories at my disposal every day. I often worry about what I’m going to write about during the week, and all those games made it easier to fly by the seat of my pants in terms of coverage.

Now I’ll have to plan more, scrounge more, branch out more. I’m sure this will mean some headaches, but it’ll also make me a better reporter.

So bring on the summer! But until then, here’s everything I wrote during this final week of the spring high school season.

McAlester track qualifies nine to 5A state meet

2 Buffs, 6 Demonettes make All-Star Game

Baseball season starts for Boys & Girls Club

Buffs tennis heads to State

Dexter Brown shoots 267 at State

Savanna’s Loud goes to Hillsdale

Taylor Horne always dancing

Buffs’ Skimbo wins state high jump title

Emily Brooks wants a lifetime of golf

Lake Eufaula Classic All-Star Game set for Saturday

Buffs tennis finishes fifth at State

Between a furlough and a baseball doubleheader in Claremore, this might seem like a shorter roundup than normal. As the high school season finally ends — although actually it went by surprisingly fast — I anticipate a change in coverage strategies. Twice this past week I traded one story of 750 or 800 words for two stories of 400 to 450, and I expect such will be the case this week as well.

Not every story can be stretched to 750 words, and I think as long as the content is newsworthy and tells the story in full, a shorter story isn’t necessarily worse than a longer one.

Here’s all my content.

Savages and Bulldogs send 15 to State

Lady Buffs tennis reaches State

Know Your Foe: Buffs baseball heads to Claremore for regional

Meredith Saunier signs with Oklahoma Wesleyan University

Buffs’ Brown makes state golf tournament

John Homer keeps Jr. Buffs in line

Regional update: Demons and Miners lose

Buffs baseball swept at Regionals

Apparently I forgot to publish last week, so this one is gonna be extra-long.

One of the stories below might put me in some hot water come Wednesday morning. But I figure if I’m gonna get readers mad at me, it should be over an issue I feel strongly about, and not, say, a dumb quote used in a meaningless column about youth basketball camp.

It shouldn’t be hard to figure out which story may not go over so well, and normally I don’t explain my writing choices. I’ve learned by now I can’t please everybody — a mother recently yelled at me because I wrote about her son during football season and didn’t want to do it again for baseball season — so normally I don’t even try.

But people may wonder why I care so much about this issue, and I’ll give my two reasons:

1) I was picked on mercilessly in elementary school for getting good grades. As such, I grew up hating seeing people being mean to other people — and really, what is prejudice but a form of meanness?

2) I’m Jewish. As such, I know very well how easily hateful language and segregating laws can transform into violence and death.

I’ll also add that if people in the majority never take interest in the issues of the minority, the minority will always be left unprotected against a majority that could enforce its will through means far worse than the vote.

Here’s what I wrote this week.

Jason Collins should open floodgates

Demonettes dreaming of state tournament

Drew House: “I can play golf ‘til I’m dead.”

Meghan Dewbery finds her own path

Addison Brown leads by example

Bowling Bulletin: Beer Money wins Monday Men’s second half

McAlester tennis sweeps Burn Out

Buffs walk-off against Highlanders

Buffs track season ends Friday

Beer Money wins Monday Men’s League

District update: Demonettes, Hornets and Lady Hornets win districts

McAlester splits soccer finale

Two Buffs coaches earn OCA honors

No-tap and kids in GBOF summer leagues

Playoffs update: Miners and Demons win districts

Motley brothers help Demons win district

Chargers run-rule Buffs, clinch home regional

Tannehill wins ORES State Track Meet

Lakewood’s John Perry signs with Mid-America Christian

News-Capitals’ Rachel Petersen wins state pool tournament

One of the lesser reasons I chose sports as my journalistic focus was so that hopefully I’d never have to cover something truly horrifying. Journalists always have to be objective, and often even dispassionate, but I never wanted to have to truly sacrifice my emotions to cover something that would otherwise upset me.

As the bombing of the Boston Marathon showed, not even my beloved world of sports is safe from the ever-encroaching terror of modern life. Realizing that has left me feeling, in the words of the column I wrote for Wednesday’s paper, “hollow.”

People told me that column was very well done — “perfect,” even, according to my editor. And while I appreciate the compliment, I’d happily and instantly trade a well-written op-ed for the three lives lost — including an 8-year-old boy and a Boston University grad student — and more than hundred shattered by what happened on Monday.

With a heavy heart, here’s what I wrote this week.

Savannah Cannon “one of the best”

Buffs tennis finishes fifth at Ada

Doug Hummel bowls double 300s

Buffs’ Pratt wins powerlifting national

Cowgirls lose to Lady Pirates in Moss tourney opener

Bowling Bulletin: Team 4 wins Senior Men’s League

Kaleisha Johnson signs with Murray State

Jr. Buffs’ Smith no-hits Eufaula

Stuart places third at Moss tourney

MHS hoops holds banquet

District tourneys begin for softball and baseball

Crowder softball run-rules Hartshorne

Joy destroyed at Boston Marathon

I got all of my work done early enough in the day so that I could cover McAlester’s noon game of a home doubleheader, which it won, 20-0. But after that, I had a choice: I could cover what would probably be another uninteresting Buffs blowout, or I could hit the road to appease a smaller group of readers and maybe catch a more exciting game at a regional baseball tournament.

I took the latter option, driving an hour to Preston to cover a Hartshorne baseball game. And as I’d hoped, I got a 4-1 pitchers’ duel that was way more interesting.

When I got back to the office, I discovered that McAlester had won its second game, 25-0, making the game I covered actually the more competitive of the two. So I think I made the right choice, but there was a cost.

Two hours of driving both ways meant that I worked for almost 12 hours Saturday. And with a furlough scheduled this week, I have very few days to get myself back under 32 hours.

I don’t mind working long days in themselves, but I’ll definitely pay for this one later in the week week, either by not being able to write as much or by needing to ask for overtime — something I absolutely hate doing.

Here’s what I wrote this week!

Turnout low for Pitt 8 softball and baseball

McAlester Gamerz continues to grow

Ngoc Nguyen finds “better life” in McAlester

Bowling Bulletin: Misfits win Mix & Mingle League

Jaci Bigham wraps career at ORU

Bulldogs win Wetumka opener

Kyle McDonald loves to field

Buffs trounce Knights in district doubleheader

Pirates beat Miners in Stuart Tournament final

OK people, it’s 2013. Why haven’t we figured out how to control the weather yet? It’s hard enough trying to stay on top of 12 schools’ worth of teams. But figuring out what’s been rained out and what hasn’t, especially on the weekend? Now it’s just ridiculous.

With my mini-rant now finished, here’s what I wrote this week.

Skye Edwards “sets a precedent”

Victor Martin keeps tradition going

Messy brackets bad for tourney

Loretta Medina always on the move

Lady Buffs unveil 2013-14 pom squad

Buffs win home tennis tournament

Eagle Hill Disc Golf Club plans first 2013 events

Haileyville’s Martin throws no hitter

Bowling Bulletin: Position rounds shaping up