The GBB Tigers have slid below .500. Their 0-2 showing in the EV-W Holiday Tournament left them with 3-6 won-lost numbers as we're all slowing down for Christmas. The third place game of the EV-W affair was played on Tuesday, Dec. 21. It had a 64-54 score with MACA having the lower number vs. the host team.
The Tigers with coach Dale Henrich will be resolved coming out of the holidays to get the numbers turned around.
EV-W built up momentum as the game neared conclusion. The Tigers faltered despite having the asset of balanced scoring. Indeed, four in our ranks posted double figures scoring. The charge was led by Sydney Dietz whose point total was 17. Plus she contributed eight rebounds and five assists.
Meredith Carrington dished out four assists and scored 13 points. Then we see Shannon Dougherty and Cate Kehoe each with 12 points. Kehoe collected seven rebounds. So there were definitely strong suits.
I get briefed on the team regularly by player grandparent Tom Carrington at DeToy's, early-morning, when our minds are quite sharp, right? We should be so lucky. It's a fan's prerogative to have opinions of course. The EV-W Eagles came out of the game at 3-4.
No reason I couldn't write a little about MACA gymnastics, but I'm not familiar enough with the language/terminology of the sport. For example, when I see that an athlete "stuck her routine," I do not know what that means!
Mayer Lutheran 75, MACA 50
Our opening game of the EV-W event had us take the court against those Lutherans of Mayer Lutheran. The Lutherans worked to an advantage with a winning outcome for them, 75-50. Turnovers killed us at the Eden Valley gym. The stat here was 22, sigh. We were buried by halftime when the score showed us down by 24.
Mayer has the "Vikings" nickname. Their stock is high in MN Class 'A', a ranking of No. 4. Those Lutherans came out of the December 20 game with an 8-0 record.
There were bright spots in our performance. Like, Sydney Dietz putting in 17 points and grabbing five rebounds. Meredith Carrington gave her grandpa some reason to smile with 13 points/five assists. Cate Kehoe came through with ten for the orange and black, so grandpa Neal Hofland could smile some too. Alas, the game's final score could not have prompted any smiling!
Boys: Tigers 87, BOLD 60
Remember the old bumper sticker "where the hell is Bird Island?" My, we're going back to the '70s. "Hell" was considered rather strong language at the time. Our neighbor of Cyrus came up with a variant: "Where the heck is Cyrus?" Bumper stickers could be a big deal then. Here's a question for analysis: Is "hell" even a profane word? Input welcomed.
The MACA boys basketball fans had to know where Bird Island was on Tuesday. Our Tigers took to the court to face the Warriors of BOLD. The West Central Tribune reported that BOLD's "scrappy lineup" was able to keep up with the Tigers in the first half. Not sure about that, really, as we led 43-34 at halftime.
I imagine the WC Tribune cares more about BOLD than MACA. Isn't it true we no longer have athletes eligible for the All Area Teams, or for the Ranweiler Award?
The Warriors certainly could not keep up with MACA in the game's second half. We truly soared, or roared, as we outscored the Warriors 44-26. So we won this game 87-60. We're 7-0, BOLD is 3-2.
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| I remember writing about Jackson's father Kevin |
Augustana sure had to be pleased with what they learned about Loge's play on Tuesday. Loge produced 32 points and nine rebounds. Plus he swatted aside four shots against the out-sized BOLD team.
Cole Visser of BOLD kept his team's hopes flickering for a time. This he did with hitting 3-pointers. BOLD had a subsequent seven-point run but could not challenge the Tigers in a sustained way. The night belonged to coach Mark Torgerson's Tigers. We are ranked fourth in MN Class AA. A merry Christmas indeed. Ahem, let's call that "holidays."
Opposing teams are sure keeping an eye on Loge. The Tigers can respond with some other options in their arsenal. So Thomas Tiernan seized the opportunity and scored 17 first half points of his game-total 19. Loge and Tiernan were joined on the scoring list by: Cole Wente 9, Durgin Decker 7, Tyler Berlinger 6, Sam Kleinwolterink 6, Brandon Jergenson 5, Trey Hunt 2 and Toby Gonnerman 1.
Tiernan showed his well-known flair with long-rangers: five 3-pointers. Loge connected twice from beyond the 3-point line. Decker, Wente and Jergenson each connected once. Jergenson and Tiernan had nine and six assists respectively. Wente and Tiernan each stole the ball three times.
The top BOLD scorer was Max Marks with 14 points. Visser made four 3-pointers, Hunter Borer three. Ryan King and Visser each had five rebounds. Ethan Sullivan had four assists and Visser had three steals.
Newspaper erratum
Looks like our Morris newspaper had an excruciatingly bad misspelled word in a sports headline last week. I do not have the paper in front of me as I write this. I only see it at the library or at church. The headline in question was the top one on the front sports page, ugh. "Reign" for "rein?" Holy cow, shouldn't we be setting a better example for our community's young people? We preach about the importance of education, and then we see this?
What if I had committed this error in my Sun Tribune career? People would have choice words, to be sure, but there's no way I would make this particular mistake. Yet I was written off by so many of our community's stuffed shirts, beginning in the late 1980s when some strong party line stuff took over in this community. I wouldn't want the ghost of Christmas past to take me there again. Our school district became a true flashpoint, turning neighbor against neighbor in some cases.
It should not have happened. Some issues simply had to be addressed. We got on a much better course as time went on. As I reflect on the "party line" folks, who socialized with each other a lot, I wonder: why so defensive, so prickly, so humorless? If you all were so right, could you not have been more relaxed?
Our music programs do not get the regular media attention of sports, of course. But surely the MAHS music programs are boffo, as we saw on December 13 when band was at centerstage. It isn't always called band, sometimes it's "symphonic winds." Ah, Spinal Tap with its "Break Like the Wind" tour!
Jazz I started out the Dec. 13 concert at our opulent concert hall. We could hardly have dreamt of such a place when I was in high school. In my high school days, concerts would be at the old elementary gym (now razed) or the 1968 gym at the high school. Actually I think the high school gym worked out great. The sight lines for the audience were better than at the high school auditorium which came later. I must confess: I have never really enjoyed the high school auditorium as it gets claustrophobic and stuffy in there.
The concert hall of today is truly boffo - ironic that our public school has this and not UMM. But we'll take it.
Jazz I gave us a reprise of "A Charlie Brown Christmas" with its jazzy feel. We could hear this every year, never get tired of it. Concert highlights for me - there were many - included the piano playing of Henry Berberi and the singing, yes singing, of Emily Hamm. The microphone became a dud for Hamm's performance - it did not matter! Her song "Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas" went over wonderfully. What impressive vocal range by Ms. Hamm.
The "Nutcracker Suite" was a classy and sophisticated concert highlight.
Kudos to the directors: Wanda Dagen and Andrea Denardo. Someday I think a statue of Dagen should be displayed on the school grounds.
- Brian Williams - morris mn minnesota - bwilly73@yahoo.com
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