Dave Newman
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Dave Newman has been the sports editor at the New Richmond News since 1988. He has covered the action in the Middle Border Conference, Dunn-St. Croix Conference and Big Rivers Conference for nearly 30 years.
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- 4 years 8 months
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For much of Monday's game, the Somerset softball team outplayed Prescott, one of the Middle Border Conference leaders. But when the game got down to crunch time, Prescott was able to force the Spartans into several mistakes. Those mistakes were costly as Prescott came back to earn a 7-6 win. The Spartans are 3-4 in the MBC standings after Monday's loss while Prescott is now 5-2. Somerset coach Cory Lindenberg said the Spartans aren't far from being the equal of the top teams in the MBC.
There are clear signs of improvement in the play of the Somerset girls soccer team, but wins remain difficult to come by for the Spartans. The Spartans faced Osceola twice in the past week. Osceola is one of the leading teams in the Middle Border Conference again this season, so these games in such a short span were a good way to gauge the Spartans' improvement. Last Thursday the Spartans lost at Osceola 3-0. The game was scoreless until Osceola scored late in the first half. The Chieftains added two more goals in the second half. The two teams met again on Monday in Somerset.
A new lineup triggered the biggest offensive night of the season for the St. Croix Central softball team on Monday. The Panthers knocked the cover off the ball, producing 15 hits in a 13-0 win over Glenwood City. Coach Jimmy Anderson has been calling sophomore Kali Lawrence his second leadoff hitter by having her bat in the ninth spot in the batting order. On Monday, she was moved up to be the official leadoff hitter. She excelled in the role, going 4-5 at the plate.
It took a no-hitter to cool down the St. Croix Central hitters. And the Panthers nearly still won Monday's game against Boyceville. Boyceville's Ryan Bloom threw the no-hitter, striking out 16 Panthers to stop Central's seven-game winning streak, 2-1. Central's pitching nearly matched Bloom's gem. Elling Hofland worked the first five innings of the game and surrendered just one hit and one run to Boyceville.
Winning is getting habit forming for the St. Croix Central boys track team. The Panthers brought home one of their biggest trophies in years last Thursday, defeating six other teams to win the championship in the Larry Zirgibel Invitational at Boyceville. Central's girls also put in a strong performance, taking second place in the meet. Central's boys finished the meet with 184 points, well ahead of Elmwood-Plum City's 122 points. E-PC took the top spot in the girls meet with 134 points.
Somerset High School will have a large number of students competing this Saturday in the 2011 Wisconsin School Music Association State Festival. Somerset will be among the schools competing in the festival in Eau Claire on Saturday. The musicians who qualified for the state festival all qualified by earning the highest possible rating, a 1*, on Class A music, which is the most advanced category of music.
After two games filled with defensive disasters, the New Richmond baseball team finally said "enough's enough." The Tigers cleaned up their act when they went to Ellsworth last Thursday and scored an 11-2 victory. The win came after losses to Somerset and Prescott, which were both filled with defensive mistakes of every imaginable type. Tiger coach Chad Fehrman said the team had 11 errors in those two games. And that doesn't include a number of flyballs that fell for hits that the coaches felt should have been caught. The errors were coming from two sources.
Playing at New Richmond seems to be the World Series, Super Bowl and Stanley Cup all wrapped into one important date for the Somerset baseball team. The Spartans won at New Richmond for the second straight year, beating the Tigers 8-4 last Tuesday. The win at New Richmond seems to come with a cost. Just like last year, the Spartans lost their next conference game, both times against Amery.
There are plenty of goals being scored in New Richmond girls soccer games. In the Tigers' win during the past week, they scored eight goals against Baldwin-Woodville. In their losses to Menomonie and Spooner, the Tigers gave up a combined nine goals. The 8-0 win came last Tuesday on the Tigers' homefield. The Tigers did an excellent job of moving the balls to the outside in the offensive zone. They would then send crossing passes into the goalie box, where the Tigers came up with numerous short-range shots. Senior Meghan Frank, a first-year soccer player, scored three of the goals.
Some of the worst imaginable conditions for tennis didn't stop the New Richmond boys team from sweeping a pair of Middle Border Conference matches last week. The worst of the conditions came last Tuesday, when the Tigers beat Ellsworth on their home court, 7-0. The Tigers went to Amery last Thursday and won by another 7-0 count. Tiger coach Mike Montello muttered under his breath that he'd never had a team play in snow before, but there were occasional flurries being carried by the vicious howling wind last Tuesday.
