The newspaper, housed in a beige brick building in downtown Muncie that sits next to a church and across the street from a bus station, is the only homegrown daily serving the city. Almost everyone in Muncie who can read, reads The Star Press. It's truly a community newspaper. For small papers, local news is more important than ever because it represents the only content that can't be easily found on spiraling cable and Internet news services. In Muncie, local news means high school sports.
People here are bonkers about it.
Scott Underwood, the paper's sports editor, says that during the school year, The Star Press devotes about 35 percent of its sports section to high school games. Lemasters's stories, in a way that most journalists only dream their work can be, often are the talk of the town. Louis Church, who goes to nearly every Muncie Central game though his kids have long since graduated, says that Lemasters's articles frequently are the subject of water-cooler chatter. This is an area where basketball is a hot issue. No matter how good a reporter or a writer you have, it's absolutely invaluable to have someone who can really provide a context to a big part of your culture.