Last Christmas, my uncle gave me this book: All Those Mornings … At the Post. It chronicles the best columns and stories by one of the Washington Post’s most famed sports columnists, Shirley Povich. It’s a great read, and contains some of the best sports writing I’ve ever seen.

But it wasn’t helping me today. My editor asked me, a senior, to write a column capturing what it’s been like covering Boston University sports for the past three and a half years for The Daily Free Press.

Jeez, how do I do that? After writing a half-page and erasing it six times (seriously), I started reaching for ideas. How have other people done this? Is there a formula to these “good-bye” columns? In a final effort, I started scanning through the Povich book to see what his approach was. After covering sports for literally seven decades, he had to have some eloquent way to illustrate it.

I mean, this guy saw it all: Jackie Robinson signing with the Brooklyn Dodgers; Ali-Frazier’s “Rumble in the Jungle”; the Olympic tragedy in Munich; and the first Super Bowl, just to name a few things. How did he do this?

The fact is, Povich didn’t. In 1998 — 74 years after his byline was first published — he wrote his final column only hours before he died of a heart attack. The subject was Mark McGwire, David Wells and Barry Bonds. If he had written anything before then summarizing his time at the Post, it wasn’t in this book.

So where did that leave me? Oh, about 300 words into my final column and not a lick of it about the Freep, BU sports or my experience with both.

Yet, as fruitless as the search through Povich’s columns was, I did realize something. Here was a man — perhaps one of the best sports writers this country has ever seen — and he didn’t get a chance to capture it all. He had his memoirs published in 1969, but those aren’t measured in pages — they’re measured in pounds. He didn’t get the 800-word column like I have now.

And so here I am, overwhelmed by the task of encapsulating seven freakin’ semesters. Should I be so lucky to write the same thing in 60 years for some other publication, show me this column so I know how easy I had it.

So, I come to you now not to try to wax poetic about this newspaper or BU athletics. I could revel in my time as a reporter here, where I made road trips to cover games with some of my best friends (Kevin Scheitrum, Andrew Cannarsa and Phoebe Sexton), was brought into the fold by another (Steve Moore) and worked my first beat (softball) and last (hockey) with another of my best friends — and the only colleague I try desperately to measure my writing against — in Mike Lipka.

But I’ve been told readers want nothing more than a good story. So, after 200-plus articles from every state in New England, here’s my story from covering BU sports for The Daily Free Press (Spring 2003–Spring 2006):

It was the first — and last — time I played on Nickerson Field during a Division I men’s soccer game, and in retrospect, I shouldn’t even have been out there.

When I covered the BU men’s soccer team during the 2003 season, I and Cannarsa, the other beat writer, always sat in the seats beside the press box. The weather was usually nice and we wanted to feel closer to the action before we wrote our stories.

During one game, an early-October tilt between BU and Northeastern, I was approached to take part in the half-time contest. I either was (a) a goalie trying to stop a shot or (b) a shooter trying to score one. The winner took home two tickets to the Patriots-Dolphins game on Dec. 7.

Now, as I reporter, I’m not supposed to take part in half-time contests; it’s not “ethical.” But back then, the sophomoric me hadn’t really taken full grasp of that yet.

So there I went, bounding down the stands with dreams of scoring a goal or making a save before 500 fans. My hopes dimmed, though, when I learned of who my opponent was. Katie Chen, then a senior on the BU women’s soccer team, registered two goals and three assists that season, and four years earlier in high school, led her league in scoring with 49 points. At the time, I wasn’t aware of the exact numbers but I knew I wasn’t going against just anybody.

“So who wants to shoot and who wants to play goal?” the event moderator asked.

“I’ll take shooter!” I cut in. In no way was I going to allow this Division I soccer player earn her tickets the easy way. I mean, she was a forward — her primary job was to score. I figured my best chance was to make her play a position she wasn’t used to.

Eventually the time came, we went on the field and I lined the ball up just inside the box.

“Whoa!” Chen said. “Get back to the 18 [yard mark].”

“Now, come on,” I said. We had agreed that I shoot from out there but suddenly it looked really far away. “I’m not a soccer player like you.” I’m not sure she realized I knew who she was before then, but she conceded the extra few feet to me.

So there I stood, trying to plot my movements while at the same time thinking, should this go in my story on Monday? Meanwhile, Chen bounced back from side to side in front me, looking as if she had played goal before (gulp).

With the event moderator giving me the signal, I glanced up toward the upper right corner of the goal, strode forward and put an inside-out spin on the ball. Maybe it was the nerves, but my shot resembled more of a chip as it floated toward the goal. Nevertheless, it still had a chance.

With my eyes fixed upon, the ball fluttered toward the upper 90. Chen, who read the shot the whole way, stepped over, put her fist out and punched the ball wide of the net just as it started to make its descent toward its intended destination.

I was crushed, and every one of the 500 fans — plus both the soccer teams who had made their way onto the field by the time — saw me fail to put a shot by (in my mind) a girl. Call me chauvinistic but it still kills me to this day.

Cannarsa welcomed me with some ribbing when I got back to my seat. “That’s why we just write about these games,” he said.

Needless to say, we sat in the press box for the rest of the season. I haven’t left since.