Disclaimer: This is only my second year on staff at the Iowa State Daily and I probably have much less experience and expertise than everyone else in the newsroom. I’m not nearly as interesting as the rest of the people writing this, but if you keep reading, I won’t mind.

When I started at the Daily last year, I knew I wanted to write sports. Sports have always been my biggest passion and, as someone who loves to pretend to be knowledgeable, I figured there was no better way to do that than by getting my stories published.

Over the past year or so, I’ve met and interviewed coaches (both professionally and at the college level), athletic directors and athletes at basically all level of sports. It’s overwhelming, to say the least.

After covering eight preseason softball games, I moved to women’s basketball. I have no idea why I was moved up to women’s basketball, which is a really great beat. I’m still convinced Luke Manderfeld sent the congratulatory text to the wrong person and was too embarrassed to take the position away from me.

On the women’s basketball beat, I covered nearly 20 games at Hilton Coliseum and another two on the road. The final game I went to was in Oklahoma City at the Big 12 Tournament.

I went down to Oklahoma City with two other members of the Daily. It’s about a 10-hour drive. We got down there the night before Iowa State’s first game, watched the Cyclones lose to Kansas State in the opener, and promptly drove the 10 hours north back to Ames.

We spent 20 hours driving for a single two-hour game, and while that part sucked, it was all part of the experience… and I loved it.

Somehow, Luke Manderfeld accidentally promoted me AGAIN. This time to football. Now, as a junior, I’m covering football and men’s basketball, which is about as good as life can get for a student sports journalist who doesn’t really know what he’s doing.

At this time last year I never would have believed I would be covering games in Jack Trice Stadium and Hilton Coliseum, talking to professional athletes and coaches, and meeting people who drove my passion for sports as a kid. I know this is a cliche, but it’s honestly a dream come true.

It’s still crazy to me that people go out of their way to pick up a publication to which I contributed. It’s always humbling to see someone on campus reading the Iowa State Daily. Having people count on you for information and news is an important task, and I’ll always appreciate being given the opportunity to have a voice with readers. Happy news engagement day.