> ## Content Index > Fetch the complete content index at: https://the-generalist.ghost.io/llms.txt > Use this file to discover other available public pages before exploring further. # The most Generalist weekend ever - URL: https://the-generalist.ghost.io/the-most-generalist-weekend-ever/ - Published: 2026-11-09T23:02:03.000Z - Updated: 2026-11-09T23:02:03.000Z - Description: Or how I learned to love covering three games in three sports in three venues in just over 48 hours. - Author: Patrick Donnelly - Tags: behind the curtain I opened this joint to talk about life as a sportswriter who keeps a lot of plates spinning in the air at the same time. This weekend, I had my hands on more plates than a Chinese buffet and kept them all from crashing as I covered the Wild on Friday night for the Associated Press, the Gophers-UCLA football game on Saturday morning for the *Orange County Register* and the Wolves on Sunday night for the AP. Oh, and I also hosted a private trivia event on Saturday evening. Let's take a look back on the most Generalist weekend ever, shall we? ### [Wild 4, Sharks 1](https://apnews.com/article/sharks-wild-score-kaprizov-a22f3ce5059b5ea1e26ec28ddaca7b5b?ref=the-generalist.ghost.io) I got to the arena around 6:30 for a 7:10 start. Unlike MLB or NBA games there's no pregame access to players or coaches in the NHL so really I just have to be there by the time the puck drops, but I like having enough time to set up my laptop, go through the game notes and get my story file set up in the AP's content management system. One advantage to being a generalist in this case is that I don't have to write features or notebooks on a regular basis like the beat writers do. So I don't show up at morning skate and try to gather quotes for future use. I just tell you all what happened during the game. Every team has their own pregame entertainment for the fans, and one thing the Wild introduced a few years back was a local celebrity leading the crowd in the "LET'S ... PLAY ... HOCKEY!" cheer before the puck drops. Friday was the first time I'd seen them sell that spot to a sponsor ... either that or Captain Morgan is just a big hockey fan. ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/d5/5f/d55f7f93-1c82-4c17-bb6a-1e45e9fda0a0/content/images/2026/11/IMG_3100.JPG) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/d5/5f/d55f7f93-1c82-4c17-bb6a-1e45e9fda0a0/content/images/2026/11/IMG_3102.JPG) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/d5/5f/d55f7f93-1c82-4c17-bb6a-1e45e9fda0a0/content/images/2026/11/IMG_3104.JPG) A tribute to corporate sponsors, round numbers and barely controlled debauchery. He also showed up later to celebrate a fan who earlier in the game caught a stray puck that had rolled off the netting behind the goal and practically fell into his lap. The fan used his 15 seconds of fame to stand up and chug not one but two beers, much to the crowd's delight. The good Cap'n joined the fan at his seat later and encouraged the crowd to cheer as the guy repeated his demonstration of chugging prowess. And if that's not a statement on how pro sports teams rely on the debauchery of their fans to make a buck, I don't know what is. The man of the hour was Kirill Kaprizov, to no one's surprise. The Wild's superstar had picked up his 500th career point on their recent road trip, so the scoreboard exhorted the fans to give 97 a nice ovation because even though 500 is just one more than 499, we do love our round numbers. Then he went out and scored a power-play goal just minutes later, his 16th of the year, tops in the NHL. By the time the third period rolls around in a hockey game, I usually write my preliminary lede, which usually follows the formula of "Player X did this cool thing to lead Team Y past Team Z ..." Kaprizov had a goal and an assist and the Wild led 2-1 going into the third, so 97 was my lede. Then Quinn Hughes scored, with Kaprizov assisting. Hughes had assisted on the first two goals, so the lede became, "Kirill Kaprizov and Quinn Hughes each had a goal and two assists as the Minnesota Wild ..." etc. Of course, that didn't last. Kaprizov added a third assist on the Wild's final goal with six minutes left in the game, so [the lede changed once again](https://apnews.com/article/sharks-wild-score-kaprizov-a22f3ce5059b5ea1e26ec28ddaca7b5b/?ref=the-generalist.ghost.io). It was an entertaining game and I got to see Sharks phenom Macklin Celebrini score their only goal so I'd call it a good night. But I had to get home for an early wakeup call ... --- ### [UCLA 34, Gophers 20](https://www.ocregister.com/2026/11/07/no-8-ucla-football-explodes-to-put-away-minnesota/?ref=the-generalist.ghost.io) My friend and sometimes boss Dave Campbell swung by my house around 9:15 a.m. to scoop me up for the ride to Stadium Village. Dave was covering the game for the AP so he had the parking pass the Gophers supply the organization for home football games. These days only the Wild and Gophers football games come with parking passes, a trend I really hope continues because there's really nowhere to park around those stadiums that doesn't cost two arms and a leg. I was covering this game for the biggest newspaper in Orange County, California. Last spring the OCR editor reached out to my well-traveled colleague Dan Hayes of The Athletic to see if he knew anyone in the area who might be free to cover the Dodgers for them when they visited Target Field in late June. He hooked me up with them, and it turns out they liked my work enough to ask me to cover UCLA on their first trip here for a football game since 1977\. (Finally, an advantage to the Big Ten's ever-expanding portfolio of universities!) When we arrived at the stadium I went through the same ritual as the night before – set up laptop, peruse game notes, prepare story files, though this time I just wrote it in Word and emailed it to an editor in greater Los Angeles. The Gophers also put out a nice feedbag for football games – this time it was an egg bake, sausages, breakfast potatoes, waffles, etc. If the food sometimes lacks in quality (seriously, the waffles were dryer than two hours of C-SPAN) they more than make up for it in quantity. And the price is right. So I brushed up on my UCLA knowledge as I ate the free chow. (The egg bake and sausages were perfect.) Pregame ceremonies are always a big draw at football games, thanks to marching bands and all the other accoutrements. Saturday's game included a salute to veterans and featured three star-spangled parachutists descending from the sky to the delight of the assembled throng. I'm always amazed those guys don't break their ankles given the speed at which they hit the turf. I also saw my first tifo at an American football game. A tifo is one of those big banners that fans roll out over an entire section before a game. They're common in soccer and I'd love to see that tradition continue a games that use the pointy ball too because why not add more color and enthusiasm where you can? ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/d5/5f/d55f7f93-1c82-4c17-bb6a-1e45e9fda0a0/content/images/2026/11/IMG_3108.JPG) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/d5/5f/d55f7f93-1c82-4c17-bb6a-1e45e9fda0a0/content/images/2026/11/IMG_3110.jpg) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/d5/5f/d55f7f93-1c82-4c17-bb6a-1e45e9fda0a0/content/images/2026/11/IMG_3111.JPG) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/d5/5f/d55f7f93-1c82-4c17-bb6a-1e45e9fda0a0/content/images/2026/11/IMG_3113.JPG) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/d5/5f/d55f7f93-1c82-4c17-bb6a-1e45e9fda0a0/content/images/2026/11/IMG_3114.JPG) Pictured: Tifo, veterans groups being honored, more boom-boom-clap, and the stands clearing out after the Gophers fell behind by two touchdowns in the fourth quarter. The tifo in question honored veterans, and later the scoreboard displayed the logos of the seven branches of the US Armed Forces. That got me thinking – are there any veterans of the Space Force yet? Anyway, the game got under way and the Gophers kept it close for three quarters against the undefeated Bruins, who were ranked No. 5 in the latest AP poll and No. 8 in the first College Football Playoff rankings. Along the way, I discovered the Gophers have become the latest team to get fans to clap after pounding on a big drum, much like the Vikings' SKOL chant. I kinda wish they'd say "SKI-U-MAH!" but instead, it's just "boom-boom-ROW" – from "Row the Boat," get it? These cheers also owe a debt to the soccer world – Norway famously rocked it during the most recent World Cup, and they stole it from Iceland, who first employed it during a surprise run to the Euro semifinals in 2016\. (I hereby ask longtime Generalist friend and reader [Jon Marthaler](https://www.jonmarthaler.com/?ref=the-generalist.ghost.io) to fill in any other uses I've missed here.) Eventually the Gophers fell apart in the most Gophers way possible, allowing two 75-yard touchdown passes to the same receiver on consecutive plays from scrimmage by UCLA. In the span of just over five minutes, the score went from 17-17 to 34-20, and the game was essentially over. The postgame situation is the worst when covering the Gophers football team because P.J. Fleck generally takes at least an hour before coming out to address the media. That's followed by two offensive players and then two defensive players taking questions, and by the time you get back upstairs to write your stories the visiting media is often packing up their bags and heading to the airport. UCLA made their head coach, the quarterback and receiver combo that scored twice, and a star linebacker available, and we got everything we wanted in less than a half hour. I had filed about 450 words on the game as soon as the game was over, and the editor emailed back edited copy for me to use for my writethru – the version where we add quotes, color and other details we might've overlooked in the rush to get a quick-and-dirty version posted on the website. I take pride in always delivering clean copy, but believe it or not sometimes a mistake slips through, or in this case the editor who has followed UCLA all season had tossed in a couple of info nuggets to flesh out my initial copy. I transcribed what I needed from the interviews, added about 300 words of quotes and tacked on a [slightly tweaked lede](https://www.ocregister.com/2026/11/07/no-8-ucla-football-explodes-to-put-away-minnesota/?ref=the-generalist.ghost.io) for my final version. Then my wonderful wife picked me up outside the stadium so I could race home, change clothes and head down to Bloomington, where I was hosting a private event for Trivia Mafia. It ended up being a pretty darn long day, but it was both profitable and enjoyable. --- ### [Timberwolves 115, Jazz 100](https://apnews.com/article/jazz-timbewolves-score-dd43be39f278968881f26af198694ffa?ref=the-generalist.ghost.io) Sunday dawned as a beautiful fall day, and I even got to spend some time helping harvest beans and tomatillos from our garden before I got ready to leave for Target Center and the 6 p.m. tip between the Wolves and the most inaccurately named sports franchise of all time, the Utah Jazz. (Seriously, that nickname was fantastic when they were based in New Orleans, but couldn't they have found something else when they moved to Salt Lake City, like the Mountains or the Teetotalers?) I took the Blue Line light rail to the warehouse district because again, no parking pass. I live about six blocks from one of the Blue Line stops so it's pretty darn convenient to get to Twins and Wolves games. And NBA coaches do meet with the media before games, so I had to be through security and in the media room by 4:15\. After hearing from Chris Finch and Jazz head coach Will Hardy, I still had an hour and a half to kill. The pregame meal costs 20 bucks at Target Center and the food is often just kinda meh so I walked across the street to grab a sandwich at Jimmy John's. Ah, the glamorous life of a sportswriter. I found out once I got inside the arena that the Wolves have moved our media seating again. When I started covering the team 25-ish years ago, the AP had two seats at the scorer's table courtside. Then they moved us to an area behind the baseline on the eastern end of the stadium (across from the Wolves bench). Now we're across the court, same seats but on the western side. By next year we'll probably all be up in the hockey press box, which might as well be on the Moon. No respect, I tell ya. ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/d5/5f/d55f7f93-1c82-4c17-bb6a-1e45e9fda0a0/content/images/2026/11/IMG_3121.JPG) ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/d5/5f/d55f7f93-1c82-4c17-bb6a-1e45e9fda0a0/content/images/2026/11/IMG_3122.JPG) Pictured: Oh the pageantry and Bones' scrum There wasn't a lot to report on with the pregame. No fun new games with the fans, very business-like actually. The Jazz have won just one game this year and although they never completely fell apart, it never felt like the home team was in danger of losing. The Wolves have shown a tendency to just kinda mess around for three quarters before putting their foot on the gas – playing with their food before they eat. And that's pretty much what happened last night. A late surge in the third quarter built their lead to double figures for the first time and they kept the Jazz at bay the rest of the way. I filed 300 words as soon as the game ended and then my work was basically done. Starting a couple of years ago, the AP decided they didn't want us to do writethrus for game stories. They want us to focus on breakouts – interesting things that we can write short separate stories on, like injuries or a spectacular play or someone breaking a record, that kinda thing. I always hit the Wolves' locker room because Anthony Edwards is liable to say anything after a game, and his pronouncements are often newsworthy. They don't want us to force it, though, because they have a lot of stories to edit and post from around the country on any given night. The most interesting thing to me last night was Bones Hyland doing Bones Hyland things – giving the offense instant energy off the bench with breakneck drives to the hoop and timely 3-pointers. I sat in on Bones' scrum in the locker room but there was nothing worthy of a breakout. So I packed up and headed to the train station, exhausted but satisfied after the most Generalist weekend ever.