What is your biggest challenge as a high school sports writer?

What our columnists and sports writers have to say as they wait for the games to resume.

What is your biggest challenge as a high school sports writer?

As an editor, my biggest challenge is making sure names of our student-athletes and coaches are spelled correctly. What we do in high school sports becomes a keepsake for families, and it's important we spell names correctly. As a coordinator, it's important to balance our coverage. And, as a writer, being accurate with information is crucial, especially on tight deadlines.

- John Radtke

Sports writers need to develop an inner clock in their head, counting down toward deadline. Working on a daily newspaper, it's something we have to deal with every night, and it's never tougher than Friday nights during the high school football season, though some track invitationals also can be tough.

- Orrin Schwarz

I dread covering games that are decided when the shortstop throws a ball away or the point guard misses a last-second free throw. I started at The Daily Herald in 1995, and much of what I learned about covering prep sports came from two of The Daily Herald's best, Bob Frisk and Lindsey Willhite. It is impossible to spend any time around them not wanting to emphasize the positive story and upbeat angle, and I have tried to do that ever since. It's always been a challenge for me writing the story when a game turns on a mistake. It's easy enough to do when I'm at a Cubs or college game but a completely different situation with preps.

- John Lemon

Accuracy. And not just because, unlike with those who cover college and pro sports, prep sports writers have to keep their own stats. It's amazing how many things a reporter can potentially mess up in even a basic game story: spellings of athletes' and coaches' names, score, play-by-play details, story details, team records, stats, grammar, punctuation, quotes, typos. And on some nights you might have 40 minutes to write a 600-word story. If you're good, you have a great lead, too. In a masochistic way, it's actually fun.

- Joe Aguilar

It's Friday night and I'm drowning in a downpour trying to figure out how to write down that last football play on my drenched piece of paper. To me, that's the toughest part about being a high school sports writer. The creature comforts enjoyed by college and professional writers simply don't exist. Stats aren't handed to us right after the game. There are no news conferences, just a bunch of out-of-shape writers literally chasing down players before they leave the field. It's not easy, but I still love it.

- Kevin Schmit

Covering high school sports has changed drastically in recent years due to technology and evolving social media. Did this job for 11 years before my first tweet was sent in 2013. Before that I never tweeted live scoring updates. Or took video with my phone. Or tweeted those video clips. Or edited them into a highlight video after the game story was written. Or tweeted a link to that story and video with all relevant hashtags and handles. Or posted it all to Facebook. Things change quickly. We have to keep up. Now, if you'll excuse me, I have to figure out TikTok.

- Jerry Fitzpatrick

My biggest challenge is covering events outside when it is cold and/or rainy. To stand outside and try to watch a game, take stats and then interview people is not easy or fun. I always feel so bad for the athletes and coaches who have to deal with those conditions as well. Can't be enjoyable.

- Patricia Babcock McGraw

The biggest challenge is trying to make everyone happy. High school sports are more about the kids playing and enjoying the game. You really want to make sure you do your best to include as many names as possible and see as many teams as possible. Since I began covering prep beats in the 1980s, I can't remember one school year when I didn't see every team in my coverage area at least once.

- John Leusch

My greatest challenge as a high school sports writer is to write concisely. I like words, and a lot of them are long. Trying to make deadline after an event that runs late also is a challenge.

- Dave Oberhelman