Steve Tucker, who died Friday in Evanston at age 74, worked for the Chicago Sun-Times for 28 years, rising from stringer to high school sports editor.
He left behind two impressive legacies. Tucker was an early champion of girls’ and women’s sports coverage. And his ability to hire and mentor young reporters was remarkable.
Tucker’s proteges went on to work in news and sports at news organizations across the country, from the New York Daily News to The Athletic and throughout the Chicago journalism world.
Tucker covered several sports for the Sun-Times, but his favorite and longtime beats were women’s basketball, softball and women’s college basketball.
“Tucker’s coverage meant a lot,” DePaul women’s basketball coach Doug Bruno said. “Even today, only 8 to 10 percent of all sports coverage is about women. It was all about having champions in newsrooms fighting for coverage of women. That’s what Steve did. He made a huge contribution to the growth of women’s sports coverage in Chicago. He was ahead of his time.
“He had a national identity as a high school women’s basketball player and a women’s college basketball player,” said White Sox beat reporter Darryl Van Shawen of the Sun-Times. “He was one of the few experts in the field.”
Tucker spent most of his childhood and adult life in Chicago. His father instilled in him a love of sports, taking him to Marshall basketball games and his 1959 World Series at Comiskey Park.
Tucker graduated from the University of New Trier in 1967 and the University of Iowa in 1972. He first worked at the Mercantile Exchange as a floor manager. In 1984, he began working as a freelancer at the Sun-Times for longtime high school sports editor Taylor Bell. Mr. Tucker remained with the newspaper until his retirement in 2011.
“Unlike me, he was a nice guy and had a lot of friends,” Bell said. “Everyone knew him and he knew everyone. He did things for women’s sports in Chicago that no one else did at the Tribune or anywhere else. He pushed himself. , said we should cover this, and I went along with it.”
The Sun-Times used to host postseason banquets for some high school sports.
“We had a men’s basketball banquet, and he promoted a women’s basketball banquet,” Bell said. “We wanted to have a baseball banquet, and he suggested we have a softball banquet to go with it. He then persuaded Cheryl Miller to be our first speaker. Then he got Pat Summitt. He knew everyone.
Tucker managed a rotating group of 30 to 40 “preppers” who wrote about high school sports and collected scores for multiple sports. The dozens of people he hired went on to bigger jobs.
“He wasn’t shy about giving people a chance,” said Sun-Times editor Bob Mazzoni. “High school sports have long been the gateway to the pros. He was willing to give an opportunity to anyone interested in it. And if you earned his trust, he gave you He would continue to give more assignments and more responsibilities. So people kept coming. Look at all the people who were under him who went on to do big jobs in journalism. It’s quite a legacy.”
Outside of journalism and sports, Tucker loved opera and bridge. He often competed in national bridge tournaments.
“Tuck was a very interesting guy,” said Sun-Times Bears reporter Mark Potash. “He went from being a trader to being a journalist, but he had a really big heart. That’s what I remember about him, what a loyal person he was.”
Bruno and Tucker became close friends over the years. Bruno was at the hospital Thursday with Tucker’s family.
“We talked every day,” Bruno said. “It became more than a writer-coach relationship. I have tears in my eyes now, but I remember those days. Every time I think about Tuck, a smile comes to my face.”
