Maureen Brown: Sun Valley, Idaho

       A home grown Sun Valley resident at the Olympics? This lede grabs every local reader who can imagine “Jazz”, a Community School student, going to the Holy Grail of skiing, Bald Mountain, to say her farewells before heading to Sochi. This lede sets the scene and allows the reader to imagine that Jazz takes Bald Mountain and us with her to Russia. I want to read more.

Winter Olympics Begin, and All That Jazz

         She’s halfway around the world today, in Sochi, Russia. But on Monday afternoon of this week, 22-year-old Jasmine Campbell of Hailey paused for a moment at the base of Bald Mountain as she prepared to travel to the 2014 Winter Olympics. Jasmine, known as “Jazz” in her days studying at the Community School in Sun Valley, is the only representative of the U.S. Virgin Islands at the Olympics. She plans to compete in alpine giant slalom and slalom. She will carry the Virgin Islands flag in today’s opening ceremonies. Here, she wears the powder-blue Virgin Islands parka at the bottom of the hill where she has learned much about the alpine sport that both her father John and mother Jen also love. Learn more about Jasmine in a story on Page 13. Photo by Willy Cook

A Confusing Lede: 

         This lede is just confusing. The author could have been more clear; why do I have to imagine anything or look at it a certain way? He also also could have grabbed his audience’s attention by focusing on another hometown hockey star, now an Olympian, Hilary Knight. Instead, the reader is left wondering is the Olympic hockey tournament a five game tournament or not? We wonder what the first two wins truly mean? We don’t learn the answer to this pivotal question until paragraph 5. I wish he'd told me this in the lede explaining Team USA was in the semifinals!

Knight gets Team USA off to fast start at Sochi

U.S. women beat Finland 3-1, Switzerland 9-0

By :JEFF CORDES

         If you look at the 2014 Winter Olympic women’s hockey tournament as a five-game competition, Team USA is skating with speed and power and now has its first two games successfully in the winning column.

     Led by Sun Valley’s Hilary Knight, the U.S. Olympic women’s hockey team polished off Finland 3-1 and Switzerland 9-0 in its first two games of the tournament Saturday and Monday at Shayba Arena in Sochi, Russia.

     The latest success came this morning as the outdoor temperatures reached 61 degrees on a sunny day besides the Black Sea. Six players scored and 13 skaters recorded at least one point to help the U.S. pound beat Switzerland 9-0.

     Team USA broke an Olympic record by scoring three goals in 55 seconds in building a 5-0 lead in the opening stanza. The second and third goals came in just eight seconds. The U.S. also set a team record for fastest five goals in an Olympic contest, scoring five times over a 6:22 span.

     With the win over Switzerland, Team USA guaranteed itself a spot in a semifinal of the eight-team women’s tournament on Monday, Feb. 17. The bronze medal and gold medal games will be Thursday, Feb. 20.