There were two stories published on the front page of Marshall University's student-ran newspaper, The Parthenon, regarding basketball. One story focused on the men's team, the other women's. The importance of these stories is that both teams played against arch collegiate rival, West Virginia University. There were numerous errors in the latter ranging from inconsistencies in tense and the excessive use of platitudes.
1. In the lede of the women's basketball story, there is an inconsistency with the noun. The team is later in the lede referred to as "they" and "their."
2. The article is littered with platitudes from players and the coach. The worst of it comes in the paragraph preceding the final one. Professor Morris said an easy way to avoid platitudes is to paraphrase. The author did not paraphrase and because of this, the word "atmosphere" is used four times in the paragraph. The coach used the word three times in a two sentence quote and the reporter used it in a sentence preceding the quote. It's annoying and distracts the reader.
3. There are numerous instances in the women's basketball story in which information is not accredited to a source. Paragraphs in general are too long, and quotes are broken at awkward places.
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