The Gladstone High School girls basketball team had a dream season this winter, winning 24 games in a row and winning a Class B regional championship for the second year in a row. Now the Braves are being recognized for that success.
Gladstone was named the Upper Peninsula Class A-B Team of the Year by the U-P Sportswriters and Sportscasters Association. Braves Coach Karl Dollhopf was named the Class A-B-C Coach of the Year for the third time in his career.Gladstone senior forward Jammie Botruff was named the Class A-B-C Player of the Year, sharing the title with Escanaba senior Olivia Nash.
Jim Hansen was hired Tuesday to become the new head coach of the Escanaba Eskymo varsity football team. The 29-year-old Hansen is a 2001 Escanaba High School graduate, and has spent the last six years as an assistant coach under Dan Flynn, who retired earlier this year.
"I'm extremely honored, and humbled, and thankful to everybody involved in the school," Hansen said, "I'm so happy and excited to have this opportunity."
The Escanaba School Board voted 7-0 to hire Hansen, who becomes just the third head coach in the last half-century in the Escanaba football program, after Jerry Cvengros coached from 1963 to 1985, and Flynn from '85 until this past year.
There's a new team in town.
The Escanaba Rollin' Hellcats Women's Roller Derby team played at the Wells Sports Complex over the weekend, before a packed crowd of more than 500. The Esky ladies lost their game to the Kingsford Krush, 180-60, but it was a fun night for everyone involved. The Hellcats practice at a small venue near Escanaba Public Safety, but this was their first actual competition.
The Michigan High School Athletic Association on Monday announced the "classes" that its 760 member schools will compete in during the 2012-'13 school year. They used enrollment figures to determine whether a school is Class A, B, C, or D. This is only used for boys and girls basketball and girls volleyball. Other sports use a "division" system. Here in the Upper Peninsula, Sault Ste. Marie moves from Class B to Class A, while Rudyard and St. Ignace move from Class C to Class D.
Police and fire sirens could be heard from Harris to Carney on Saturday as the Carney-Nadeau boys basketball team returned home from East Lansing, following the team's appearance in the Class D state semfiinals. Several hundred people turned out as the boys enjoyed an escort from the county line to the school.
They just stood there on the ice. Stunned. A feeling of disbelief. Could it really be all over, just like that? After all of the ups and downs the Escanaba Eskymos have faced this hockey season, every boy truly believed that after upsetting Marquette in the regional semifinals, the hockey gods were finally smiling on them.
And when the boys rallied from two goals down Sunday in the regional championship game, well, that just reinforced the confidence that somehow, someway, this team would find a way to pull out a dramatic win over the Traverse City Central Trojans.
The USA Hockey Tier III National Championships are going on in Rochester, Minnesota, and there is a local connection to one of the teams that will play for a national championship Tuesday afternoon. 2010 Escanaba High School graduate Brent Kallio is a member of the Atlanta Knights, which beat Billings (Mont.), 4-2, in the national semifinals Monday afternoon. Kallio had two assists in the game, and now has five points in four games in the tourney.
The magical post-season run of the Carney-Nadeau Wolves came to an end Thursday night, as the Wolves dropped a 52-44 decision to the Climax-Scotts in the Class D State Semifinal at Michigan State University's Breslin Center.
The Michigan High School Athletic Association lists the Carney-Nadeau School with an enrollment of 71 students. But on Thursday, the Wolves boys basketball team will play in the state's biggest venue: Michigan State University's Breslin Center.
SAULT STE. MARIE---They weren't supposed to win either of their conferences. They weren't supposed to win their district. They certainly weren't supposed to win their regional. And the Carney-Nadeau boys basketball team most certainly wasn't supposed to beat the Pellston Hornets in the Class D state quarterfinal game Tuesday night in Sault Ste. Marie.
The Negaunee Miners lost in the Class C state quarterfinals Tuesday night at Petoskey High School, falling to a talented Traverse City St. Francis team, 71-60.
Escanaba nine-year-old Nicole Kamin won the championship at the Elks Hoop Shoot Regional Finals over the weekend in Angola, Ind. She made 19 of her 25 shots, and then made all five shots in a tiebreaker to take first place in the competition.
The Negaunee High School boys basketball team will face a tough challenge Tuesday when the Miners take on Traverse City St. Francis in the Class C state quarterfinal in Petoskey.
Carney-Nadeau boys basketball team will face a powerful Pellston Hornets team in the Class D state quarterfinal Tuesday night in Sault Ste. Marie. The Hornets are led by senior Chris Hass, who has scored 2,492 points in his career and will attend Bucknell University next year.
The Escanaba Junior Hockey Association held its annual banquet Monday night, and announced its top awards winners for the just-completed hockey season. The top award, the Ovid Provo Award, went to graduating senior John LeMire. LeMire was a defenseman on the Eskymo hockey team this season, scoring three goals and nine assists this season. He had a +9 rating. Also, Erin Gregoire of the Great Lakes Wolfpack Under-19 girls hockey team won the Herbert Kristen Award.
The Escanaba High School Fan Club held its annual "Spring Fling" event over the weekend, and as part of the evening, two awards were handed out.
The Escanaba School Board voted 5-1 Monday night to hire Kirk Schwalbach as the high school's varsity baseball coach. Schwalbach served as assistant coach for the past three years under Don Lauscher. Lauscher resigned last fall after five years in charge.
Schwalbach has coached five different Gladstone Little League Baseball All-Star teams over the past decade. He was the manager of the Delta County Senior All-Stars that earned a state tournament appearance in 2009. He is a 1979 Escanaba HS graduate.
The Michigan Tech Huskies were less than five minutes away from their first WCHA Final Five win in more than 15 years before ninth-ranked Denver turned the tables and came away with a 3-2 overtime victory in front of 11,489 fans in St. Paul, Minn., Thursday. The Huskies led, 2-1, before DU's Luke Salazar scored, sending the game to overtime. Then, 2:38 into the extra session, Denver’s Jason Zucker scored the game-winner.
The Upper Peninsula will not be home to a high school girls basketball state champion this year as the Saint Ignace Saints and Crystal Falls Forest Park Trojans both lost their state semifinal games on Thursday at Michigan State University.
The 74th annual Gold Medal Basketball Tournament is being held this weekend in the small Menominee County town of Hermansville. The tournament began Thursday night with four games, and five more games were held Friday.
The temperatures were 70 degrees and the skies were sunny on Wednesday, so the Escanaba high School boys baseball and girls softball teams took advantage by holding scrimmages and practices outside, rather than in the gym
The Escanaba High School hockey team held its post-season banquet Wednesday night at the House of Ludington. Supporters gathered with the team for a meal of chicken and pasta, and an awards ceremony.
Negaunee Miners pulled out a 47-46 win over the Iron Mountain Mountaineers in the Class C boys basketball regional championship game Wednesday night in Escanaba. The top-ranked Miners trailed, 34-29, entering the fourth quarter but rallied down the stretch to take the lead, as Tyler Jandron scored 17 points.
Carney-Nadeau High School has seen many girls basketball teams go downstate over the past 25 years. But the boys basketball program had never won a regional title, until Wednesday night, that is. The Wolves beat the Munising Mustangs, 57-51, to win the Class D title at Negaunee High School.
The most successful season in the history of Gladstone High School girls basketball seemed destined to end, one way or another, at Michigan State University's Breslin Center. The girls were playing their best basketball of the season, clicking on all cylinders, riding high on a 24-game winning streak. But Tuesday night at Alma College, the Gladstone girls simply ran into a better team. The Freeland Falcons had too much firepower and the Braves could not match them offensively, losing, 66-52, in the Class B state quarterfinal game in central Lower Michigan.
The Carney-Nadeau Wolves won their first boys basketball district championship Friday night, turning back the Bark River-Harris Broncos, 58-56, in overtime.
The Gladstone High School girls basketball team had a rough first quarter in Thursday night's Class B regional championship game against Ludington. But after falling behind, 15-6, the girls ramped up the defensive intensity and overwhelmed the Orioles, 65-54, in Gaylord. Jammie Botruff scored 21 points, including 14 free throws, and Katie Becker added 16 as the Braves won their second straight regional title.
The Gladstone High School boys basketball team had a poor first quarter, falling behind, 15-4, and was eliminated by the Menominee Maroons, 60-50, in the Class B district semifinals Wednesday in Gladstone. The Braves gave up too many offensive rebounds, and the quick Maroon guards were able to get numerous steals that were turned into baskets at the other end of the court. Jared Vuksan led the Braves with 19 points, and his team closed to within seven points on several occassions in the fourth quarter. But Menominee's Jared Rivard nailed long jumpers on all three occassions to hold Gladstone at bay, finishing with 16 points. Bryan Hines had 14 points for the Maroons.
The Escanaba High School boys basketball team did not roll over and let the highly ranked Sault Ste. Marie Blue Devils dominate them. Despite the amount of youth on the floor Wednesday night, Eskymo Coach Tracy Hudson and his boys executed a strong game plan and nearly set the U.P. basketball world on its ears. Escanaba led for most of the game but lost to the Blue Devils, 64-58, in overtime. The Eskymos led early, 15-5, and had a 35-27 lead at the half. The EHS lead was 51-42 with six minutes to play in the fourth quarter, but the Sault Ste. Marie defensive pressure eventually took its toll. The Soo finished the game on a 22-7 run.
