The homepage of the Detroit Free-Press, whose dominating story is game coverage of the Michigan-Michigan basketball game.
Normally when I'm can choose my own topic for my #loweclass weekly blog post, I cover something sports related. However, this weekend I was going to try to cover something different for my beat, to not only give myself a change of pace, but my readers as well. But after the drama of the Michigan-Michigan State basketball game, I had to critique the Detroit Free-Press's coverage of the game.
As I was reading the article, I was happy with what the Free-Press had done to cover the game. The Free-Press had their own reporter cover the game rather than someone working for USA Today, and there were three videos of post-game press conferences, which I think more news outlets should do. Give readers the ability to not only read the reporters analysis of the game, but also what the respective coaches thought about the game. The lead in the story was also the caption for the photo on the homepage, which I think is a little lazy by the reporter and the designers of the website. But, it still serves the purpose for drawing the readers to click on the story.
Another aspect of the story that I enjoyed was "the breakdown." The breakdown highlights the hero of the game (Trey Burke), the goat (Keith Appling) and an interesting fact of the game, which in this case, happen to be the alumni of Michigan State purchasing fifty tickets so Michigan State students could attend the basketball game. I applaud the Michigan State alumni for doing so, because having fans being able to cheer on their team in an opponent's arena can give the team a little extra edge. Just ask Marquette.
My only complaint is the story is a little short and lacks depth from outside the last four minutes of the game. Sure, the run by Michigan State in the last four minutes created the drama, but there had to have been bigger events that happened outside of the time frame. Was there a big dunk that caused the student section to erupt? A block that stopped Michigan State cold for a few minutes. A player that saw a unusual amount of minutes? The readers don't have the answers to these questions because these moments are never talked about.
The piece by the Free-Press is good though. It highlights the biggest point in the game and looked ahead for both teams. I would have liked too seen a little more analysis of the game overall, but the story wasn't necessarily an analysis of the game as much as coverage of the game. The author of the article was a member of the Free-Press and put effort into the multimedia to tell the story even more.
As I was reading the article, I was happy with what the Free-Press had done to cover the game. The Free-Press had their own reporter cover the game rather than someone working for USA Today, and there were three videos of post-game press conferences, which I think more news outlets should do. Give readers the ability to not only read the reporters analysis of the game, but also what the respective coaches thought about the game. The lead in the story was also the caption for the photo on the homepage, which I think is a little lazy by the reporter and the designers of the website. But, it still serves the purpose for drawing the readers to click on the story.
Another aspect of the story that I enjoyed was "the breakdown." The breakdown highlights the hero of the game (Trey Burke), the goat (Keith Appling) and an interesting fact of the game, which in this case, happen to be the alumni of Michigan State purchasing fifty tickets so Michigan State students could attend the basketball game. I applaud the Michigan State alumni for doing so, because having fans being able to cheer on their team in an opponent's arena can give the team a little extra edge. Just ask Marquette.
My only complaint is the story is a little short and lacks depth from outside the last four minutes of the game. Sure, the run by Michigan State in the last four minutes created the drama, but there had to have been bigger events that happened outside of the time frame. Was there a big dunk that caused the student section to erupt? A block that stopped Michigan State cold for a few minutes. A player that saw a unusual amount of minutes? The readers don't have the answers to these questions because these moments are never talked about.
The piece by the Free-Press is good though. It highlights the biggest point in the game and looked ahead for both teams. I would have liked too seen a little more analysis of the game overall, but the story wasn't necessarily an analysis of the game as much as coverage of the game. The author of the article was a member of the Free-Press and put effort into the multimedia to tell the story even more.
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