Kentucky pulled out a nice eight-point victory last night to top Kansas for the NCAA men’s basketball championship.
Here’s a look at the way the result was played on front pages in Kentucky and Kansas…
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HERALD-LEADER
Lexington, Ky.
Circulation: 89,050
This is the eighth national title for Kentucky. The Herald-Leader made that the focus of a poster treatment on today’s page one.
The Herald-Leader‘s Dennis Varney tells us:
Design by me (Lead Sports Designer) and Brian Simms (Design Director). Photo by Mark Cornelison.
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COURIER-JOURNAL
Louisville, Ky.
Circulation: 142,801
Over in Louisville — whose Cardinals came within nine points of making it to the final game — the Courier-Journal celebrated the win by the state university.
The celebration shot is by staffer Michael Clevenger.
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CINCINNATI ENQUIRER
Cincinnati, Ohio
Circulation: 140,877
The Cincinnati Enquirer blew the story out across its across-the-Ohio-river edition today.
The team celebration picture is by Derick E. Hingle of USPresswire. Derick also took the action shot that was played considerably smaller in the main edition today.
 
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JOURNAL-WORLD
Lawrence, Kan.
Circulation: 27,813
In Kansas, disappointed looks were spread across page one today. This one by Mike Yoder of the Lawrence paper is particularly nice. And particularly large.
This illustrates part of the problem with poster fronts. If your team wins, then you have room for a great, memorable display. But if your team loses? It’s difficult to shift gears late at night and slap two or three more stories out front.
Got to admit, though, that’s a great picture.
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TOPEKA CAPITAL-JOURNAL
Topeka, Kan.
Circulation: 33,425
Topeka ran its own page-one shot quite a bit smaller.
That shot is “special to the Capital-Journal” by Mike Gunnoe.
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WICHITA EAGLE
Wichita, Kan.
Circulation: 67,003
Less effective, perhaps, is this picture on the front of Wichita today.
That’s an interesting juxtaposition of shapes created by the two Kansas players with their hands on their knees. But I’m not sure it conveys the emotion of the loss or the disappointment of the fans — which the lead picture must address if you’re going to go with that particular headline.
The secondary picture helps somewhat. But not quite enough.
The lead picture is by Rich Sugg of the Kansas City Star. Sadly, the Star itself didn’t show up in the Newseum today. [UPDATE: See below.]
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KANSAS CITY STAR
Kansas City, Mo.
Circulation: 199,222
UPDATE: 5 p.m. EDT
The Star, in fact, created a beautiful front with a fabulous headline.
The page was designed by Charles Gooch and Greg Branson. The photo is by the aforementioned Rich Sugg.
Charles tells us the page…
…didn’t make Newseum for reasons that are beyond me, but it did make it to SportsCenter last night.
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TIMES-PICAYUNE
New Orleans, La.
Circulation: 135,716
Leave it to the big paper in the host city to come up with the best headline of the day.
Brilliant.
The lead picture is by Times-Picayune staffer Ted Jackson.
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The Lexington front page was sent to me by that paper. The rest are from the Newseum. Of course.
