Most of the webpages on Strib Varsity are free to read. We collect and receive scores and stats from more than a dozen sports. Coaches and their designees help Strib Varsity connect to every high school in Minnesota. Strib Varsity has added more than two dozen features since we launched about 100 days ago. One or more of those sentences might have been news to you, and that’s why I wrote this article.

Hello! My name is Sydney Lewis and I’m the product manager on Strib Varsity. Over the last several months, I’ve been leading the effort to build the new Strib Varsity site that replaced the old High School Hubs. Since we launched stribvarsity.com and its thousands of sub-pages on Aug. 11, we’ve received a lot of feedback telling us what we got right and, of course, what we got wrong.

One thing we’ve heard consistently is: “I hope you’re not done updating this website.” Great news: We’re definitely not done adding to Strib Varsity.

The even better news is that we have a whole team of people (like myself) whose entire job is improving this site. You can expect weekly changes to the site that improve your experience. Since launch, here are some of the things we’ve added, adjusted or just plain fixed:

• We’ve added individual student-athlete stats on our game pages and team pages. There are team pages for every team in 14 sports. For winter sports, every hockey and basketball team (boys and girls) in the state has a team page. Are you a fan of Warroad girls hockey? We got you! Fan of Eden Prairie girls hoops? We got you! (Go Eagles!) You get the idea.
• We’re always looking for ways to improve navigation on the site. We recently moved team buttons to the top of school pages for easier navigation to each team. Every high school in the state has a homepage! Hit the Hawley High homepage and read about the Nuggets’ big volleyball championship! And there are hundreds more just like that one.
• Use our site search tools to look up schools and teams you want to follow.
• Schedules for each sport were recently improved. Here’s the girls hockey Scores & Schedules page for you to check out as an example. Use the date selector at the top to look back at scores and look ahead at schedules.
• We’ve improved box scores, rosters and more since we launched in August. Look for more team-focused improvements coming later this year, too.

And here’s what the team is working on next:

• We’ll be improving team schedule displays.
• We’ll be making some tweaks to game pages so they’re easier to navigate.
• Improving the mobile experience so it’s easier to view full stat tables and box scores on your phone.
• The livestreaming experience on Strib Varsity will continue to improve. Here’s our Livestreaming homepage where we list both upcoming games and keep past games available for on-demand viewing.

Circling back to the top of this article: Yes, our journalism often is behind what we call a “paywall” in the news business (subscribe to read/watch) or a “reg-wall” (register to read/watch). But a majority of our pages are “open,” aka free to read. All the thousands of webpages for stats, scores, rosters, schedules, team homepages, school homepages — those are all free.

One of the main reasons those pages are free is because the information there actually comes from a passionate group of readers: coaches and school staff members. They’re the ones often sending us the scores and stats and schedules, and we thank them for their commitment.

I’ve developed a passion for Strib Varsity (can you tell?!), and I love discussing what it is now and what it needs to become as it evolves. We know how much high school sports and our coverage of the student-athletes and teams means to all of you. Stick with us and watch us improve as we go.

What are we missing? Email me at sydney.lewis@startribune.com and let me know! Even better: let me know if you want to join a group that helps us make decisions about new features as we develop them.

Thank you for reading Strib Varsity!

- Sydney

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More: 10 things to know about Strib Varsity

When we launched in August, we shared 10 interesting things about our new site. Read this article to learn more.