How to WordPress

Choose from any one of these three templates, depending on the sport.

Most of the template changes should be self-evident, but some notes on the trickier parts:

• The hed/post title should always be USC vs. CollegeName — live updates for home games, or USC at CollegeName — live updates for away games. Make sure you’re placing this hed in both the designated block, as well as the Post Title up top.Once the game is over, change live updates to as it happened.
• To set the live scores, first open the Code Block on the left column.Scroll down to where const apiURL is defined.The number after ?event= in that URL is the ESPN game ID. (e.g. in the example above, the game ID is 401524053)

  Find the ESPN gamecast for the game in question. Take a look at the URL, e.g. https://www.espn.com/college-football/game/_/gameId/401524025. Notice here the game ID is 401524025. Replace that game ID in apiURL — then press “Save.”

  

• Each live updates page has a MetaSlider photo slideshow showcasing photos fed in live from the court/field.
  To create a new slideshow, you can find MetaSlider on the left sidebar. Open it in a new tab.Click “Add New.”

  To add photo slides, click “+ Add Slides.”

  The Media Library should open. You can shift-click to add as many photos as you wish. Once you’re finished selecting, click “Add to Slideshow.”

  Once a slide is added, change the caption to “Add manually,” then add the photo credit WITHOUT parantheses, e.g. Jordan Renville / Daily Trojan

  Last thing to check (on the right column) is that the dimensions of the slideshow are 1030 x 700 px.

  Remember to save the slideshow (bottom at top right). Now we copy the shortcode over to the live updates page. You can find the shortcode at the bottom of the right column; if you click the text it should copy to the clipboard automatically.

  Now, back on the live updates page itself, note the dedicated box for that shortcode — at the top of the middle column. Copy-paste the shortcode here.

  

• You’ll notice the byline for live updates pages are located on the pinned update.The format for that byline is as follows, for example:If a home game —Ethan Inman & Darren Parry from Galen Center / Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum; photos by Louis Chen & Bryce Dechert

  If an away game —

  Ethan Inman & Darren Parry from Eugene, Ore.; photos by Louis Chen & Bryce Dechert

  Notes: Names are always bolded. Follow AP style for city/state names.

• The further reading section in that pinned update is where you can feature articles, including columns, that were published as preview coverage for that game. For football games, that would be all the Sports articles from that Friday’s spextra. For basketball games, it would usually be the one or two preview writes.These further reading articles should be in bullet point format, with each bullet point being a complete sentence or question. Usually it can mimic the hed, dek or another good sentence from the article itself. Hyperlink to the article as well.

Now for the actual metadata of this page:

• Excerpt/Yoast SEO meta description: e.g. “Writer 1 and Writer 2 report live from Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum.” or “Writer 1 and Writer 2 report live from Autzen Stadium.”
• Categories: set as “Main Feature” and “Sports Main Feature”.
• Tags: Writers, photographers, sport, semester, “live-updates”.
• Featured image: If a home game, grab a file photo of the Coliseum or Galen Center. If an away game, you can leave the featured image blank for now; make sure to ask the photog to grab a few pre-game photos day-of so you can add those ASAP before the game.
• Schedule the post for game day at 9:00 a.m., or at least three hours before the game, whichever is earlier in Pacific Time.

The first update that should go up is the T-30 update. This update should tell the reader a) that there are 30 minutes left before game start, and b) the basics of what the reader needs to know about this game, and what they should expect. Here is one example:

We are roughly 30 minutes from kickoff between the USC Trojans and the No. 6 Oregon Ducks. It will be a battle here at Autzen Stadium between two of the best offenses in the country, the Ducks ranked No. 2 nationally in total yards per game and the Trojans ranked No. 8 in that category. Stay tuned for live updates.

This T-30 update should also be posted to X/Twitter and Threads.

The next important update is the score updates — generally for football only. (You don’t need to update every single time a team scores during basketball games.) This goes for touchdowns and field goals scored by either team.

First title the update with who scored and how, formatted in Heading 4:

• TOUCHDOWN TROJANS. / FIELD GOAL TROJANS.
• Touchdown Bruins. / Field goal Bruins.

Note the difference in capitalization, and also the period at the end of each.

For end-of-quarter / end-of-half updates, there should be a hed for that update formatted in Heading 4, as follows:

• Note: If possible, try to add a photo to each of these updates, with photo credit underneath in Heading 6. This photo credit SHOULD have parantheses. Sometimes this doesn’t always work out, in which case you can skip and just post the update without a photo.

Remember to UPDATE THE PINNED UPDATE INTERMITTENTLY.

First, remember to change the hed/post title from — live updates to — as it happened.

If you’re writing a brief as well, WordPress that article as you would for any Sports article. See “Sports (hard-news article)”

To then embed it into the live updates page:

• Place two Separator/Whitespace blocks, and a Text Block in between, all above the pinned update (see below)
  
• Now in that Text Block, add Read the article: in Heading 6, then underneath, the hed of the brief in Heading 4, with the brief itself hyperlinked. Then press Save.