This week we again have winter and spring items with a splash of fall.
Track and field
Jackson County Central graduate Jessica Christoffer had two personal bests as the South Dakota State women’s track and field team opened its outdoor schedule at the Emporia State Relays in Kansas.
She was second in the 1500 meters with a time of 4:29.22, which is now seventh all-time at SDSU.
Christoffer was also third in the 800 meters in 2:13.34.
For the SDSU men at Emporia State, Fairmont grad Andrew Moeller placed 12th in the 800 meters with a 1:55.93 clocking.
Fairmont graduate Allison Lardy of North Dakota placed ninth in the shot put at the Bobcat Invitational at San Marcos, Tex. with an effort of 46-1 1/2.
Last week, she placed sixth in shot put at the Hurricane Invitational at Coral Gables, Fla. with a throw of 45-10 1/2.
College baseball
The weather conditions in Salem, S.D. Saturday were 28 degrees with a 12 mph wind, making for a feels like temperature of 18.
That may have provided good reason for students from the University of South Dakota to stay in Vermillion and watch the Coyotes’ women’s basketball team in the NCAA tournament.
Or if you attend Minnesota State University, maybe instead of traveling the better part of three hours you find a place to watch the Mavericks in the NCAA men’s hockey tournament.
But, the players on the club baseball teams from USD and MSU decided it was a beautiful day to one-up Ernie Banks and play three.
JCC graduate Alex Bretzman was the winning pitcher for USD in the second game. He had a tough first inning as the Mavericks scored six, but he settled down to earn his first win of the year.
He wound wind up going six innings, allowing seven runs (four earned) on six hits, walked five and fanned eight.
The Coyotes won that game 17-9 after taking the opener 13-8. The Mavericks won the final game 12-2.
Bretzman drew a couple of walks in the third game for USD.
South Dakota is now 3-4-1 overall on the season, 2-4 in the Mid-America North.
The Coyotes will play Northern Iowa next weekend at a site to be determined.
College softball
Conditions weren’t much different back in Vermillion where JCC grad Aba Turner and the North Dakota State softball team was taking on USD in a Summit League series.
The teams split on Saturday, with the Coyotes winning the first game 5-4 and the Bison taking the nightcap 7-1. USD won Sunday’s game 8-1.
College football
The South Dakota State football team is going through its spring practices.
Quarterback coach Zach Lujan talks about JCC graduate Rudy Voss at about the 2:05 mark of this clip:
Three class track and field
Track and field teams in Minnesota will compete in three classes this spring.
Jackson County Central and Martin County West will both be in Class A in the new format.
The Huskies and Mavericks will compete in the Section 2A South Sub-Section meet at Mapleton on Thursday, May 26. Qualifiers advance to the Section 2A meet Saturday, June 4 at Todnem Field at Mankato West High School.
The state Class A meet is June 9-10 at St. Michael-Albertville High School.
Fairmont is in Class AA and assigned to Section 2AA.
This is actually the second time the Minnesota State High School League has had three classes for boys track and field.
There were two classes (A and B) of competition from 1923-1928, and then one class from 1929-1972.
For the 1973-1975 seasons there were three classes (AA, A, B).
There was a two-class format (A and AA) from 1976-2021.
Girls track and field didn’t start until 1972 and used a one-class format through 1975 and then used the two-class system from 1976-2021.
30 years ago
Dean Walters shared a memory of the 1991-92 Jackson High School girls basketball team on his Facebook page a couple weeks ago.
This is what he wrote:
WHERE does the time go…..30 years ago these young ladies became LEGENDS! They were playing the #1 Team in the State (Storden-Jeffers) on this night and it was not looking good. As the #8 seed, most people thought we had no chance. My assistant (Tom Schuller) and I put together a plan to take down Goliath….and the dream almost came true. Down only 1 at half, these athletes fought to the end but ended up losing 32-24. I was so proud of all of them. THIS is why you play the game. I miss all of them terribly but I will always have this great memory of these Blue Jays!🏀🏀🏀🏀
That game is an example of why I’m not a big fan of the shot clock coming to high school basketball. But, the horses are out of the barn and a 35-second shot clock is coming to Minnesota at the start of the 2023-24 season.
There are a couple of famous games (both girls) where teams slowed the pace down. And that’s underselling it.
Both were postseason games, which contributes to them being more memorable.
One was just four years ago involving two Big South Conference schools. The other was a little more than four decades ago and took place not far over the border in northwest Iowa.
On Feb. 27, 2018, Marshall traveled to Waseca for a first-round game in the Section 2AAA tournament.
Coach Dan Westby had his Tigers use an exaggerated stalling tactic. Marshall held the ball up to eight minutes at a time without dribbling, passing or shooting.
The Waseca activities Twitter account sent out this tweet while the game was in progress:
The Bluejays would eventually win the game 17-4. Marshall was 2-for-9 from the field in the contest.
“We came into the game saying, ‘Guys, we aren’t going to take anything but a layup or a wide-open three,” Westby said on KMHL Radio after the game. “And it was my decision and I’m sure there’s a lot of people not happy with the outcome of the game, but it’s a 13-point loss and it doesn’t matter if you lose 73-60 or 17-4. It’s still a 13-point loss.”
Waseca had won the regular-season meetings between the teams by scores of 60-52 54-37.
“We’d played this team a couple weeks ago and lost by 17 and I just felt that if we line up and went toe-to-toe with them all night long, that was going to be difficult for us,” Westby said. “I know there’s a lot of people upset about the way the game was played, but it is what it is. We made a decision, and the flip side of that is Waseca had opportunities to come out and get us and they chose not to do that either.”
Now for the famous low-scoring game in Iowa, one that makes 17-4 look like a track meet.
Iowa was way ahead of the curve compared with the rest of the country in regard to girls athletics. The first state girls basketball tournament was held in 1920. Minnesota’s first state girls basketball tournament was in the fall of 1974. There was another state tournament in the winter of 1975.
Girls basketball in Iowa was a 6-on-6 game until 1993 with three forwards and three guards.
The 6-on-6 game was high scoring. The highest scoring game in state tournament history was the 1968 championship game in which Union-Whitten defeated Everly 113-107 in overtime.
The lowest scoring game in Iowa came in a district final in 1979.
The final score:
Melvin 4, Sibley 2. In four overtimes.
There was no jump ball to start the contest in the six-player game. Melvin got the opening possession of the game. A Sibley player never touched the ball until there was one second remaining in the first half.
The stall continued in the second half as Sibley coach Henry Eekhoff had his team play a delay game also. Melvin coach Roger Tasler felt if he had his guards come out to challenge Sibley they would foul.
At the end of regulation the score was 0-0.
After the first overtime it was 0-0.
The first points of the game occurred in the second overtime, which ended 2-2.
There was no scoring in the third overtime, still 2-2.
Melvin scored early in the fourth overtime and would go on to claim the 4-2 win.
Annandale wins title
Annandale won the state Class 2A boys basketball title Saturday, upending Minneapolis North 60-49.
It’s the first state title for Skip Dolan in his eighth state tournament appearance.
Jackson County Central met up with Annandale in both the 2016 and 2017 state tournaments.
In 2016, the Huskies won 63-46 in the semifinals.
Bodey Berhends had 20 points, eight rebounds and seven blocks. Matt Ringkob scored 18 points.
The next year the teams met in the quarterfinals.
Jacob Christopher scored 33 points for JCC, but was called for his fifth foul on a charge through the lane with 4:18 to play and the Huskies leading 54-52. The Cardinals would win it 66-61.