Filed under: Football
Heckuva final hour of that game!
Everstine and I found a Coug-friendly bar in Pioneer Square, where we watched and yelled at the TV. A few straggling Huskies were gloating toward the end of regulation — little did they know. Those last two minutes were amazing, and the overtime induced some real nailbiting.
How cool it was to finally see Paul Wulff smiling. I don’t think I’d seen that all year. This season had been written off for months, but an Apple Cup victory makes it successful enough in my book.
Hopefully the game puts some heart and drive back in the football team. They’ll need it next season (I know, there’s one more football game this season against Hawaii, but whatever). Now we can all turn our attention toward the basketball team.
Filed under: Football
I guess we’ll see what happens. Hold on to your butts.
66-3. That’s really all I have to say about the Cougars’ embarrassing loss to Cal on Saturday. It was the worst loss ever in WSU history. Hey, at least I was there to witness it.
I have proof. Here’s my postgame/highlights video from the romp.
SEATTLE — Well, um, WSU football has started. Too soon, apparently. The Cougars need more practice. A lot more practice.
But their 39-13 fall to Oklahoma State was still a good reminder of how this fall will be for me. Running around Qwest Field and eating small, old Red Deliciouses will soon give way to running around Martin Stadium and eating soggy Subway sandwiches. And my ability yesterday to work without a jacket will soon give way to numb fingers and chapped lips.
And, hopefully, my five hours of post-game video editing will soon give way to, let’s say, three hours. That would be nice. I need go get a new system down now that I have my new HDV camera.
Nevertheless, here’s my video from WSU’s first football game of the season, of the Paul Wulff era. Enjoy.
The Shock, Spokane’s arenafootball2 team, lost the big game Monday — a one-loss team upset by a six-loss team in the Arena Cup. I’ve now been to three of their games, more than enough to make up my mind: I’m not an Arena Football fan.
Nevertheless, it was still a sad evening at Spokane Arena after the sudden-death OT ended and the Vipers had won 56-55. Not as much fun to produce a “boo we lost” video than a “yay we won” video, but I probably finished it up quicker. (I closed my work laptop at 2 a.m.) Here’s the postgame vid I threw together.
Tuesday was the first day of fall football practice in Pullman. Naturally, I was there to cover it with my new HDV video camera. It was an all-day venture, but I’m pretty pleased with the result.
Last week I got my hands on my new gear, a Sony A1U camera with the XLR adapter. I also got a wireless lav mic, but I haven’t used it yet.
But I have used my new camera — three times already, in fact. Here I’ll post two of my videos from last week. The first is from July 29’s Spokane Shock practice, when they were preparing for their first playoff game of the season. The second is from Saturday’s game, which they handily won.
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My most recent assignment from my editor was to experiment with what we can do for the Spokane sports teams on video. His edict was to try something with a beat reporter on camera, telling the viewer about whatever team the reporter covers.
Apparently, the two youngest reporters on the sports desk are the only ones who were — at least the other day — open to experimenting. So Jessica Brown and I set off to make a video on the Spokane Shock arena football 2 team. This is what we came up with.
It’s very much like a TV report — but better (in my opinion). It gives readers the chance to put a face with a byline, and it solidifies that reporter’s position as an authority on the subject. Jessica did a great job, but many reporters would not be so good in front of a camera or doing voice over. It’s also longer and more in-depth than a 30-second TV spot.
Then again, it’s very much like a TV report. Is this really innovative for newspapers to do, or are we just recycling an older form of video and posting it on our website? Most everyone in the newsroom this morning loved the video, and most of the readers did, too. But is it the best we can do?
That’s why I’m viewing all of this as an experiment, just like my editor said. We’ll see what works. This apparently does, but maybe something else will work even better.
Standing in the sun for nearly three hours Saturday at the last WSU football practice of the spring left me with a little memento. The back of my neck is a beautiful red, my nose is pink and I have attractive burn lines (as opposed to tan lines) on my biceps thanks to my shirtsleeves.
And it is wondrous! It’s been in sunny and in the 70s for the past three days, and I really couldn’t ask for more.
For the heck of it, here’s my story wrapping up spring football and Saturday’s pseudo-scrimmage.
DENVER — So, I was home for two days but I only just found enough free time — on my second night in Denver — to update my blog. I’ll link to what I did back in Pullman.
I flew back to Spokane, and hence Pullman, after a drive, on Saturday. And on Sunday, I had to do a preview story for WSU spring football, which started Monday. Access was going to be a large problem — access to coaches and players. I wrote a temporary brief for Monday’s paper with the assumption I wouldn’t be able to talk to anyone, and sent it in to the Spokesman.
Sunday afternoon was the WSU basketball team’s NCAA selection party at Bohler Gym on campus, a larger extravaganza than I had anticipated. With limited battery life (I was charging it on the court in between shooting), I took enough footage to piece together this video (also linked from the picture to the left) on the party and the Cougars’ reactions to their surprise No. 4 seeding in the NCAA tournament (which is why I’m now in Denver).
As luck would have it, while I was there I spotted football coach Paul Wulff and grabbed him, knowing I wouldn’t otherwise be able to talk to him for my spring football story. He was very pleasant, and invited me with his family into the football office, where I did a quick (8.5-minute) interview. The results are this story.
On Monday, I headed over to campus at 2 p.m. in anticipation of Wulff’s 2:30 press conference, which went off without a hitch. Then I strolled over to Rogers Field (the practice field below the WSU library) to watch the first day of practice. All three hours of it. Standing up, in my dress shoes, as the weather got steadily colder. There, I interviewed a few players and got enough to put together this story on the first day of spring ball.
Of course, it was St. Patrick’s Day (I spent an hour — yes, one full hour — ironing my only green dress shirt, which I hadn’t worn since last spring precisely because it was wrinkled beyond recognition as a shirt), so that night I met up with the Evergreen crew for some celebration. Not too late, though, because I had my 12:30 p.m. flight to catch out of Spokane en route for Denver. (Noon doesn’t sound very early, but I had to leave Pullman at 9:30 to get to the airport, which required a 7:30 wake-up time — which is early for me.)
Anyway, now I’m in Denver, one day after arriving, updating from my 10th-floor room in the downtown Marriott. A nice hotel, to say the least.
