LSU sports information directors have many responsibilities in their respective sports, not the least of which is producing annual media guides to promote LSU’s athletic program.
And every year since 2002, LSU has received at least one national award from College Sports Information Directors of America in recognition of the school’s consistent hard work on its media guides.  
The 2007-2008 women’s basketball media guide received the honor of best in the nation. The women’s basketball media guide also won the award in 2002-2003.
The guide was written by former LSU sports information director Brian Miller and designed by publications coordinator Jason Feirman.
“It’s a great honor to be up there with some of the other schools that do these media guides,” Feirman said. “Really, it’s representative of the sports. We’re just trying to give them a book that shows how well they perform on the field or the court. We want to reflect their winning and championship spirit with the books we produce.”
The role of the media guide is two-fold, Feirman said.
“Our audience is two parts – student athletes who are potential recruits to LSU and the media, and there’s also the fan base,” Feirman said. “You have to attract everybody with the information you put in there and sell the university and the athletic programs as much as possible. You want to show off their highlights, their history and traditions, their coaching staffs and everything LSU athletics offers.” Women’s basketball associate head coach Bob Starkey, who helped Feirman and the publications department put together the award-winning media guide, said the talent of the writers and designers pays off.
“[The media guide] is one of the few things we’re allowed to send out to coaches and recruits, so it really helps us get different things across to the recruits if it’s designed well,” Starkey said.        Starkey also said the work he sees devoted to media guides is tremendous.
“There’s a lot that goes into it – a lot of statistics, stories, history, artwork and graphics,” Starkey said. “Those people up there are extremely talented. They don’t do media guides for just a couple of sports. Every sport at LSU has a media guide, so they definitely work hard.”
Feirman said the time involved in producing a media guide varies between three weeks and three months depending on the sport.
LSU men’s tennis sports information director Alex Restrepo wrote his first media guide for the 2006-2007 season, and CoSIDA awarded him best in the nation and best cover.
Restrepo said it was a great honor for his first media guide to be voted No. 1, but he gave a great deal of credit to the publications department.
“Not only is the information valuable, but also the way it’s presented to the media or to potential student athletes,” Restrepo said. “Jason [Feirman] and his staff understand that better than anybody in the country, and they’re the reason why we’ve had so much success with our guides.”
The most difficult section of a media guide to compile is the team’s history, Restrepo said.
Starkey said the competition to create the best media guides is as challenging as the sports themselves.
“Sports information [directors] have the same number of schools to compete against,” Starkey said. “There are 330 NCAA Division I schools that put out media guides, and for us to be ranked No. 1 in the country, that says a lot.”
—-Contact Rachel Whittaker at [email protected]