The Massillon Independent sports writer Chris Easterling won a first-place writing award in the 2020 Ohio Associated Press Media Editors newspaper contest.
The organization announced the honors this week.
Easterling won in the “Best Sports Enterprise” category for his story “Team Rob,” which chronicled former Massillon Tigers star Robert Partridge’s battle back from an accident in 2018 that left him a quadriplegic.
Easterling and B.J. Lisko also won second place in the “Best Special Sports Section” category for the newspaper’s 2020 high school football preview.
Overall, 52 newspapers submitted 1,418 entries in the competition, which features news and sports stories, features, editorials, columns, graphics and photos from last year.
The Independent competed in Division I, which included other newspapers such as the Coshocton Tribune, The Ironton Tribune, Xenia Daily Gazette and The Marion Star. The Division I entries were judged by editors at the Petoskey (Michigan) News-Review and the Alpena (Michigan) News.