Mitchell Northam is Breakaway’s new Senior Author for girls’s school sports activities

It wasn’t that way back, so I can nonetheless vividly recall overlaying my first nationwide championship recreation in 2019 in Tampa. I bear in mind attempting to comb away the confetti off my keyboard as I attempted to file a narrative on deadline from my courtside seat. I bear in mind the frustration on the faces of the Notre Dame gamers. I bear in mind watching DiDi Richards bounce into NaLyssa Smith’s arms and the joy and pure pleasure coming from the Baylor bench. I bear in mind questioning in regards to the two groups that misplaced within the semifinals – Oregon and UConn – and questioning whether or not the Huskies’ reign was over, and whether or not Sabrina Ionescu might get again right here the subsequent season (a query we by no means acquired the reply to, because of the COVID-19 pandemic). Greater than anything, I bear in mind being hooked on ladies’s school basketball.

I maintain a corkboard in my residence workplace that’s coated in media credentials from the previous decade that I’ve spent as an expert journalist. There’s one from a go to to NASA’s Flight Facility in Wallops Island, Virginia, two from superior Military-Navy video games, a couple of from wild NASCAR races, one from a enjoyable Division III lacrosse championship, one other from a memorable U.S. Open in Pinehurst, and numerous items of paper and plastic from school basketball video games.

Hanging off one thumbtack on the board, I’ve a blue ACC lanyard that holds the credentials from the 4 ladies’s school basketball Ultimate Fours that I’ve coated. The fixed on these passes is my identify, however every part else is completely different, from the brand for the championship to the colour scheme, and to the outlet I coated the video games for. Every of these 4 credentials has a unique information group printed on it. I suppose they’re that method as a result of I believed it was necessary for me to be at every a type of, to see the video games, to seize the moments, to inform the tales and to do some boots-on-the-ground reporting. So, the identify of the information group on every of these credentials represented whoever was paying me probably the most that yr, however I used to be usually doing work for a number of publications at these tournaments.

Final yr, I produced 64 items of content material for 9 completely different information organizations throughout March Insanity. The yr earlier than, 60 for 10 completely different shops. Through the 2021-22 season, 98 items of content material for 12 completely different information organizations — all on ladies’s school basketball.

Once more, like I stated, I used to be hooked.

I’m not pointing that workload to toot my very own horn. I be aware it as a result of there’s a bunch of different writers and reporters like me doing the identical kind of work on this house — piecing collectively each little job they will seize to make one thing of a profession out of overlaying ladies’s sports activities. We don’t do it as a result of we love the additional paperwork and calculating our mileage when tax season comes round, or as a result of we like badgering editors with invoices, or as a result of we like staying in shady Airbnb’s as a result of we are able to’t afford the media motels.

We do it, and maintain doing it, as a result of we love the sports activities and we love the work.

Ask most folk who’ve tried to make overlaying ladies’s sports activities a full-time dwelling they usually’ll all most likely inform you a similar factor: it’s actually arduous. This house will not be a stepping-stone. It’s important to adore it. It’s important to be hooked on storytelling. It’s important to be obsessive about the video games. It’s important to know your topics and audiences deeply. You do it not for the cash, however as a result of you may’t wait to inform readers and followers what you simply noticed. You wish to describe it to them over and over. You wish to give these athletes, these coaches, these groups and their tales – who’ve been ignored for much too lengthy – the eye and highlight they deserve; above the fold within the newspaper, the lead story on the nightly information, pinned to the highest of a web site’s homepage, and among the many first issues the almighty algorithm spits at us on Instagram.

I wish to consider that every one of these issues apply to me – that I do love this, that I’ve fought for honest protection, and that I’ve grinded to inform these tales and labored arduous to attempt to make a dwelling doing it. However then the imposter syndrome creeps in and I get a bit uncomfortable touting my resume or patting myself on the again. I’m only a reporter, a author, and – as a result of that is 2025 – a content material creator. So, I’ll simply let my work converse for itself.

My identify is Mitchell Northam and I’ve been overlaying ladies’s sports activities since 2018 when Howard Megdal gave me the chance to cowl the WNBA’s Atlanta Dream. By the subsequent spring, I used to be overlaying my first Ultimate 4 for NCAA.com and making ready to spend a season overlaying the NWSL’s North Carolina Braveness for the Orlando Sentinel. Since then, I’ve turn out to be an AP High 25 voter, a member of the USBWA board for girls’s basketball, and I’ve advised a bunch of tales for a bunch of various information organizations about ladies’s sports activities, together with USA As we speak’s For The Win, the Baltimore Banner, the Related Press, the Raleigh Information and Observer, the Miami Herald, The Subsequent and North Carolina Public Radio.

And that’s what I goal to maintain doing right here at SB Nation, the place I’ll be a Senior Author overlaying ladies’s school sports activities for Breakaway. I’ll inform tales about triumphs and heartbreaks, about failures and comebacks, about record-setters and barrier-breakers, about candy wins and insufferable defeats, about changemakers and trendsetters, about iconic stars and under-the-radar contributors, about big-time gamers and enjoyable moments, about inspiration and tragedy, about followers, the impression of cash, and adjustments to the game. And I’ll do this by not simply the written phrase, however with movies, photographs and audio as properly. A few of these tales can be targeted on the planet of ladies’s school basketball, however others can be set in softball, volleyball, lacrosse, soccer, area hockey and gymnastics. Others can be in rising sports activities like wrestling and flag soccer, which I can’t wait to dive into. I’ve made ladies’s school basketball – particularly the ACC – a little bit of my area of interest over the previous few years, however I’m excited to broaden my lens and canopy this sport and others on a nationwide stage.

These are the kinds of tales I’ve been attempting to inform in ladies’s sports activities for the previous few years. The distinction now could be that these will all be in a single place, below the banner of Breakaway – a crew I’m extremely keen to hitch.

I’m additionally very grateful to have this chance. Arising with the precise quantity is tough, nevertheless it’s secure to say there aren’t many writers and reporters who cowl ladies’s sports activities full-time on a nationwide stage. Regardless of the determine is, it’s miniature in comparison with the variety of of us who cowl males’s sports activities as their lone job. After years of piecing collectively freelance gigs to pay my very own approach to the previous three Ultimate Fours and different highway journeys for video games across the nation, I’m grateful that I’ll have a singular platform to inform these tales, and to have the backing of a information group that’s investing in protection of ladies’s sports activities.

Quickly, I’ll get the chance so as to add a fifth to that assortment of Ultimate 4 credentials. And once more, my identify would be the identical, however every part else will change. This time, I’ll look down and see “SB Nation” hanging from my neck in Tampa in April.

It’s a little bit of a full-circle second for me. One of many first locations I ever wrote for, method again in 2013 once I was nonetheless a pupil at a faculty you’ve by no means heard of – Wor-Wic Group Faculty – Black & Crimson United introduced me aboard to weblog about D.C. United. Finally, I’d write for six completely different crew websites at SB Nation, getting invaluable reps and studying from some nice individuals alongside the way in which.

Some 12 years later, I’m again at SB Nation with a brand new title and at a unique stage of life, however my objective remains to be the identical. At Breakaway, I’m going to attempt to inform tales about athletes, coaches and the individuals in ladies’s sports activities as they proceed to interrupt by.

Put extra merely, I’m right here to make fascinating and good things. See y’all on the web.