A brief look back to Week 6 of the high school football weekend that was.

 

Upset of the Week: Chippewa Falls McDonell over Gilman. McDonell QB Jon Schoch threw 3 touchdown passes and rushed for over 50 yards in the Macks upset win over Gilman and snapped the Pirates 15 game winning streak. Gilman had a chance to tie the game in the closing minutes of the 4th quarter but the extra point attempt misfired. Adding to the Pirates woes was the fact that their leader Trevor Rosemeyer went down with a leg injury and could be out for the season. Those in the know say he may have a torn ACL.

 

Augusta, Eau Claire Regis, and Cornell secured their first conference victories of the season. Augusta nipped Thorp 26-20, Cornell beat Prairie Farm 34-26 while Regis beat Loyal 38-16. The victory by Regis was especially sweet for the Ramblers who have endured a turbulent past couple of weeks having to deal with a high profile post-game incident that occurred in Owen.

 

-Reports have surfaced Plum City's RB Chris Biederman has a shoulder injury and may not play this week. Biederman has 884 yards rushing and 19 touchdowns so far this season.

 

Several area football teams have qualified for the playoffs or are one win away from qualifying for the playoffs. You can see the list of teams along with their enrollment numbers right here:
West Wisconsin Football Playoff Qualifiers

We will update this list every weekend just after that weekend's games have been played.

 

Swinging to the other side of the pendulum there are some teams who have their backs up against the wall and need to win out to qualify for post-season play. Those teams include Eau Claire Memorial, Rice Lake, Hudson, Augusta, Cadott, Altoona, Osseo-Fairchild, Cochrane-Fountain City, Amery, New Richmond, Cornell, Grantsburg, and Birchwood/Weyerhaeuser.

 

Congratulations to area girls golf teams and players heading to Madison for the state golf meet. The teams and players include Division 1: Hudson ( Julie Juchno, Katie Ecker,Arika Krinke,Kiki Buege, Eli Anderson, Molly Fassbinder)  Division 2: Amery ( Kelsey Magnine,Andrea Bilderback,  Stephanie Olson,Kashia Hill,  Anna Northway) Baldwin-Woodville ( Dannel Kielmeyer, Karlyn Sturtevant, Alexa Harmon, Erica Timmers, Michelle Hinz) Osseo-Fairchild (Anna Vold, Mallory Young, Megan Ives, Kylee Witte, Addie Vold, Tess Steen)

Individual state girls golf qualifiers from the area include Casi Webb (Eau Claire North), Jenny Benoy , Alyson Sullivan ( St. Croix Falls ), and Lindsey Danielson ( Osceola- 2 time defending champion ) 

 

Hats off to the Eau Claire Immanuel girls volleyball team who this week beat Melrose-Mindoro 3 games to one and snapped the Mustangs 21 match winning streak that dates back to last season.  The Lancers are now in first place in the Dairyland conference with a 7-0 mark.

 

It wouldn't be far fetched to see 4 girls volleyball teams from Eau Claire County at the state tournament in Green Bay in a few weeks. Let's look at the current landscape. Eau Claire North is undefeated in Big Rivers Conference play and in first place. Eau Claire Memorial is right behind them in 2nd place so they are the teams to watch in Division 1. In Division 2 we have a fully healthy Altoona team who is tied for first place in the Western Cloverbelt Conference. In Division 3 we have Eau Claire Regis who is also tied for first place in the Western Cloverbelt and has been playing very well lately. In Division 4 we have the afore mentioned Lancers who have been flying under the radar a little bit but playing extremely well.

 

West Wisconsin Sports will have the post-season volleyball pairings, dates and locations on our website when those pairings are released in a few days.

 

Can you envision with me somebody from out of state calling a friend this week and asking who was this week's WIAC football player of the week? The response would be Mitch Schaeuble from UWEC. The reaction might have been How does a punter get to be a WIAC player of the week??

The afore mentioned senior Mitch Schaeuble had never taken a snap under center for the Blugolds as a QB until last Saturday at UW-Oshkosh. Schaeuble came in off the bench and sparked the Blugolds offense to a 21-20 win over the Titans. Hats off to the Blugolds defense too for getting a key 4th down stop in the 4th quarter in Blugolds territory. They stuffed Titans RB Andy Moriarty on a 4th and one situation. Schaeuble was named the West Wisconsin Sports player of the week on Tuesday morning before the afternoon announcement of him being this week's WIAC player of the week.

 

You can see the afore mentioned Blugolds host UW-La Crosse this Saturday at Carson Park at 11:30. The game will be televised by WQOW-TV 18 and WXOW-TV 19. The pre-game show will begin at 11:00.

We'll go out on a limb and predict a Blugolds 24-17 win on homecoming day.

 

Some area high school basketball coaches will be inducted this weekend into the Wisconsin Basketball Coaches Association Hall of Fame. They include Bill Gipp (Spooner-boys) Harold Mulhern (Durand-boys), Arnie Skrukrud (Fall Creek-girls), John Pollack (Durand-girls), and Dick Diener ( Colfax-boys, also coached at Fond du Lac)

 

Speaking of coaching, you may have noticed over the past few months I have been filling you in on the number of basketball coaches coming and going to/from area high schools. The turnover rate at this point in time is pretty high and not only in this area but statewide. Mark Miller of wishoops.net recently wrote an excellent article talking about this and some of the reasons why with quotes from John Walsh-boys bball coach at Osceola, Jerry Petitgoue-boys bball coach at Cuba City and more. You can read the article here. http://www.wissports.net/sports/hoopsb/article.asp?fid=9&nid=14531