For those who haven't figured it out yet--not only am I a fan of Radford University athletics but I am also a fan of West Virginia University athletics as I was raised a Mountaineer fan over the course of my grade school years. I also happen to be a person who can be critical of times where the media simply stinks at doing their job properly.

Typically, this means red-marking newspapers when I see errors in them and occasionally sending an email to online sources when I find a major error on their site or a critical misspelling of a player's name on their home page--the Chicago Cubs' home page had the name of one of their players misspelled on their top two plays of the year section.

New Year's Day was an exciting, yet somewhat stressful, day for me when it came to watching the Toyota Gator Bowl. The Mountaineers were taking on the Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets from the Atlantic Coast Conference in a 1 p.m. kickoff. WVU played a horrendous first half, allowing the Yellow Jackets to pass all over its 3-3-5 stack defense and hit receivers in double, even triple, at times, coverage.

The Mountaineers, playing without star sophomore running back Steve Slaton (who only touched the ball three times in the running game, before removing himself from the game because of an injury that he thought he would be able to play through but could not), rallied from down 18 points behind fellow sophomore quarterback Patrick White to defeat Georgia Tech, 38-35, in regulation.

It was recently brought to my attention the recap that the Associated Press had posted following the game's finish. The party that sent the link to me was furious at how the recap was written and being a member of the media myself, I figured the article may have been slightly biased and my source was just overreacting. However, upon reading the article, I was appalled at how poorly-written a recap the article actually was.

To be honest, I'm not even sure it could actually be called a "recap" because it never recapped what happened in the game besides the stat sheet of one Georgia Tech wideout and the final score. Nothing. I decided to post the article below with commentary along with it in red. You decide if it's actually a game recap. If it is, it should have more than just the final score and a mix of pre- and post-game quotes. It should have a handful of statistics from both teams and basically tell a story of what happened during the contest so those who didn't watch it would know what happened without having to take the time to skim through the long play-by-play.

Slaton not effective, but West Virginia rebounds for Gator Bowl victory [I suppose one could go with this title but it's very misleading, I believe. Slaton was injured heading into the game. If anything, why didn't they highlight White's passing performance, where he went 9-of-15 for 131 yards and two touchdowns, or even his rushing performance, where he picked up 145 yards and a touchdown on 22 carries? No, instead we are given a title highlighting the wrong player.]

JACKSONVILLE, Fla. (AP) -- Sometimes even triple coverage isn't enough to stop Calvin Johnson. [Ain't that the truth--CJ was darn near unstoppable during the game. The opening's fine with me even though it would generally be better to go with something about the winning team. Perhaps how it was WVU's second straight bowl win with the final score being 38-35. (The Mountaineers topped Georgia in the Sugar Bowl last season, 38-35)]

Johnson leapt between two West Virginia defenders and in front of a third for a 32-yard reception in the third quarter of the Gator Bowl on Monday, one of his nine catches for 186 yards and two touchdowns in Georgia Tech's 38-35 loss. [A good follow-up paragraph. It gives the reader the stats on what was teased in the lead and also gives the final. More than likely, there should be about one or two more paragraphs on Johnson, perhaps even a quote, before the article moves onto game recap.]

The All-American junior made the Mountaineers' secondary look helpless all day in what may have been his collegiate finale. [And it should be--the guy's NFL-ready, in my opinion.] Johnson is considering forgoing his senior year for the NFL, and the 6-foot-5 wideout looked ready to make the transition.

"I'll have to sit down and decide it pretty soon," Johnson said. [Alright, let's get to what actually happened in the game, now, shall we? That is what the word "recap" refers to, right?]

Johnson wouldn't give any hints after the game about his intentions but said he and his family would make the decision together. [We get the idea. We know Calvin Johnson's a great player. But there was at least 43 other players who took the field during the game, correct?]

"After this, it's going to be a hard decision, I know that," said quarterback Tyler Bennett, thankful for having Johnson to throw to in his second career start. "Whatever he decides, it will be the right decision for him. Everyone wants him to stay but all the NFL guys want him to go."

[Recap, please?] Johnson's yardage total on Monday put him fifth in the Gator Bowl record book -- and in pretty good company. He finished behind Andre Rison, Javon Walker and Fred Biletnikoff and in front of Marvin Harrison. [Oh, I guess not. Maybe the next paragraph, perhaps?]

[Nope, here's another quote about Johnson.] "His play today was typical. That's what we've come to expect from Calvin," Tech coach Chan Gailey said.

[Fine, we've given Johnson his due. Now, let's recap what occurred during the game. Here's what could have been used from here:

Even with Johnson's career performance, the Yellow Jackets were unable to overcome the high-octane offense of West Virginia, which rallied back from a 28-10 second-quarter deficit to cap the program's best comeback in a bowl game.

6-3 250 lbs. fullback Owen Schmidt scored with 1:06 left to go before the half to help pull the Mountaineers back within 11 with a successful Pat McAfee extra point attempt. The bruising back had rumbled for 52 yards on WVU's first play of the game in the first quarter and carried the ball past the goal line after a 27-yard scamper by White that brought the Mountaineers to the Georgia Tech 1-yard line and an unsuccessful attempt by Schmidt to cross into the end zone for WVU's first score of the game.

"A good quote from Schmidt would be nice to go here. If a quality one wasn't collected, that's fine--we'll just move onto more game recap."

GT running back Tashard Choice bumped the Yellow Jacket lead back to 18 after halftime on a 5-yard run that capped off a 46-yard drive that began on a surprise onside kick that opened the third quarter.

It would end up being the final time that Georgia Tech would put points on the scoredboard, as the Mountaineers would score the game's final 21 points.

...you see, dear readers, that is a well-written game recap. It tells you what happened during the game. But let's see where the article went way after it should have broken into the summary.]

Johnson won the Biletnikoff Award this year as the nation's top receiver and was named the Atlantic Coast Conference player of the year. Before Monday's game, he had 1,016 yards receiving and 13 touchdowns, fourth-best in the country.

For his size, Johnson is also extremely athletic. He runs a 4.4 40-yard dash and has a 45-inch vertical leap. The combination makes him difficult to defend, even with a scheme keyed to stop him. [It's at the point where I start to wonder if this was supposed to be a pre-draft report about Johnson instead of an actual game summary. Perhaps the folks at the Associated Press got confused. Yeah, that must be it.]

"What can you say about Calvin Johnson? We knew coming in he was going to be dangerous, but he just ran over top of us," West Virginia coach Rich Rodriguez said.

[Here's the link for those interested in checking it out: http://sports.espn.go.com/ncf/recap?gameId=270010277]