Alumni Spotlight – Elizabeth Treffinger (Jones) ‘95

Sometimes careers are based on life-long passions; sometimes they start by accident. For Elizabeth Treffinger (known to York Daily Record readers as Lyzz Jones), it was decidedly the latter.

Lyzz describes herself as a “solid B” student at SHS. She was in 9^th grade chorus, did some things with AFS, and was a member of student council. But the focus of her high school life involved sports.

She was a three-year letter winner in girls’ varsity basketball, starting as a sophomore in 1993. She also ran track in her senior year and was a member of the school’s first girls’ soccer team in 1994. As a senior aide, she worked for (then) Athletic Director Tom Hoover.

In fact, most of her high school memories are about sports, like the Warriors’ big win against AAAA powerhouse, Red Lion on the Lions’ home court in 1994. She still remembers the score, 44-39, along with every shot she made and missed.

In addition to the mentorship of her coaches, Mark McCusker in particular, she remembers the influence of social studies teacher Carolyn Adams, a strict disciplinarian and taskmaster. “I was really afraid of her,” she remembers. “But she told me once that she was hard on me because she thought I had great potential. It had a profound effect.”

“I had no desire for a career in journalism,” she says of those days. “I wanted to be in sports management and saw myself as a high school athletic director and coach. It all started with my answering an ad for a part-time clerk in the York Daily Record sports department in 1998.”

Along with the YDR job, Lyzz worked her way through Towson University with a variety of additional part-time work, including waitressing and coaching in the Susquehannock girls’ basketball program.

After earning a Bachelor of Science degree in 2002, she continued her education, earning her Master’s of Education degree in Sports Management from Millersville University. But something happened along the way.

She grew to love her job at York Daily Record.

She held onto her position as a part-time clerk there for six years and then took a temporary job covering the high school sports beat, a three-month assignment.

Her performance impressed her editors, and she was offered a full-time job as a copy writer laying out the sports page, and she was hooked. When a position opened as assistant sports editor, she decided that this is what she wanted to do.

She was officially a sports journalist.

Lyzz is now Sports Editor for the paper. In addition to those duties she is editor for YDR’s  GameTimePA, the paper’s pioneering web presence, which incorporates information from three sister news outlets into a live summary of high school sports activity in central Pennsylvania. For her work in this medium, Lyzz was named one of Editor & Publisher’s “25 under 35” in 2013. The website has also earned a host of awards.

Lyzz lives in Spring Grove with her husband Brian Jones, (also Class of ‘95) and their two children. Even though her work hours make life difficult, she places a premium on spending time with Brendan (14) and Ava (8) and tries to never miss their activities, which (predictably) include a heavy mix of youth sports.

Thanks to Elizabeth Treffinger (Jones), Class of 1995, for making us Warrior Proud.