With just one week left in the high school regular football season some things are becoming more clear while some things are more muddied than ever. Let's take a look.......

 

For the first time this century there's someone other than Menomonie hoisting the Big Rivers Conference crown. Chippewa Falls defeated Menomonie 14-13 on Thursday at Williams stadium to take sole possession of first place in the BRC. The win snapped the Indians 47 game conference winning streak that dated back to 2001 and was the first home loss for the Indians in Williams stadium. The Cardinals can claim the Big Rivers title outright with a win on Thursday over Eau Claire Memorial.

 

Things in the always tough Heart O' North conference just became a lot more cloudy with Hayward's 26-19 upset over previously unbeaten Spooner. Spooner and Chetek are now tied for the conference lead with 5-1 marks with Ladysmith and Bloomer just one game back at 4-2.  The final week has Chetek playing at Barron with the Golden Bears needing a win to get into the playoffs. Spooner is hosting an always tough Ladysmith team and Bloomer hosting an up and coming Hayward team. There could end up being a 4 way tie for the conference title so it will be an exciting week to say the least.

 

Congratulations are in order for the following teams who have wrapped up conference titles or at least a share of them. The afore mentioned Chippewa Falls ( BRC)  Eleva-Strum (Dairyland) Somerset (Middle Border) Plum City ( Lakeland-South) Shell Lake ( Lakeland-Small) Owen-Withee (Small Cloverbelt) Stanley-Boyd ( Large Cloverbelt ) and Glenwood City (Dunn-St. Croix ) 

 

You can check out the growing list of area teams who have qualified for the WIAA football playoffs and see the teams that need a win in the final week to clinch a playoff spot right here:
West Wisconsin Football Playoff Qualifiers

Congratulations are in order to teams that clinched spots within the past week and they include River Falls ( first playoff appearance since 1999 ) Baldwin-Woodville, Ellsworth, Durand, Pepin, (one of the smallest schools in the state) Superior, Chippewa Falls McDonell and Turtle Lake.

 

West Wisconsin Sports will have the playoff brackets for all the football teams in Divisions 1-7 on Friday afternoon in the printer friendly html format so stay tuned. In the meanwhile you can look at the 2006 brackets which are on our website.....look for the link on the left side of our homepage.

 

The WIAA volleyball playoffs are set to get underway on Tuesday. We will have the scores for you in all 4 divisions and updated pairings as we go along in the tournament.  Check the playoff scoreboard pages for updated pairings and locations and good luck to all the area teams. Northwestern, Osceola, Stanley-Boyd, Eau Claire North and Eau Claire Immanuel are among area teams that clinched conference championships in volleyball so congratulations to them.

 

Ellsworth native Nate Gruber was recently elected into the Winona State University athletic Hall of Fame. Nate graduated WSU in 1995 and still holds the Warriors record for interceptions (25)  Nate was a 2 time All-American and helped lead the Warriors to conference championships in '93 and '94.

 

Somerset RB Tony Martin set a new Middle Border Conference rushing record for yards with 363 yards on 37 attempts in the Spartans 44-0 over New Richmond back in Week 7.

 

Fall Creek's RB Wesley Anderson accumulated 290 all-purpose yards in the Crickets 28-21 over Altoona in Week 8 and what made the feat even more special was that he did all that on his 18th birthday.

 

Osceola's Lindsay Danielson captured her third consecutive Division 2 individual state golf championship this past week. Danielson shot a 147 over the two day event which was held at the University Ridge Course in Madison. Danielson is only the 2nd golfer in state history to win three straight championships and she will go for the 4 peat next year.  Junior Casi Webb from Eau Claire North finished 5th in the Division 1 individual competition with a two day score of 154.

Going over to the golf team competition we had Hudson finishing 9th in Division One with a two day team score of 750.695

Amery finished 2nd in Division Two with two day team score of 695, Osseo-Fairchild finished third with a score of 761 and Baldwin-Woodville finished fifth with a score of 783.

 

Former Green Bay Packers Santana Dotson and Gilbert Brown were in Eau Claire recently to help support Women's Breast Cancer Awareness Month. 

 

UWEC Sophmore. Craig Kolb (Marshfield) was recently named WIAC football special teams player of the week for his game-winning 46 yard field goal with 24 seconds left to propel the Blugolds to a thrilling 31-29 homecoming victory over UW-La Crosse.

 

UWEC Senior Sarah Hansen (Bangor)  was recently named the WIAC Women's Golf Judy Kruckman Scholar-Athlete of the year. Hansen has a 3.54 GPA and is majoring in elementary-education.

 

The University of Wisconsin Men's hockey team opened the 2007-2008 season with a 4-1 over Notre Dame on Friday night. Senior Josh Engel (Rice Lake ) scored his first career goal for the Badgers.