Weekend wrap-up: Eau Claire Memorial honors 1968 championship baseball team
May 1—The ceremony held Saturday at Eau Claire Memorial to honor the Old Abes' 1968 state championship baseball team was sparked by a comment a student made to athletic assistant Jon Redwine during an open gym session in the Eagles' Nest over the winter.
Redwine explained the student was standing on one end of the gymnasium looking up at the baseball banners hanging on the wall and commented, "We were good in the 60s." Redwine responded, "Yeah we were."
Redwine remarked during the ceremony that the seemingly chance conversation sparked an idea of, as he put it, "what would it take to get that team together again?" He joked with the assembled crowd that he now knows what it takes to get that team together. Approximately 15 members of the 1968 team were able to be present at the ceremony.
Current coach Dan Roehl heavily emphasized the importance of teamwork in building friendships that can last a lifetime. He referred several times to watching the current team interact with the last team to win a state championship for Memorial, and how he hoped his current squad would take the lessons about the teamwork exhibited by the 1968 team to heart and maintain the connections and friendships being built right now on the baseball field.
He called the level of collaboration necessary for success on the diamond "a gift." Roehl also considered the chance to meet the older players to be a gift. He detailed watching 1968 pitcher James Howe warm up Friday evening to throw out the first pitch of the Abes' game against the Superior Spartans.
"I watched Jim spend about 30 minutes warming up on the football field, and told him after a while to leave some gas in the tank," Roehl joked.
Redwine expressed gratitude to all players and family members in attendance, and especially thanked Howe for his scrapbook of memories about the season, and became audibly emotional when talking about hearing the story of how junior Richard Vorpahl boosted the ball over the fence into the Carson Park football field for the championship game's only run. The ceremony seemed especially poignant considering Memorial's most recent trip to the state tournament was last season. It seemed both Roehl and Redwine both wanted this season's young players to take away the importance of working with others for a common goal from the reunion of the school's last state championship team.
The underlying message of the remarks given during the ceremony, seemed to be, "nothing is beyond you, if you work on it together."
Longbella earns tour card
Chippewa Falls native Thomas Longbella has earned a tour card for South Africa's Sunshine Tour, one of the world's top pro golf circuits.
He finished in the top 25 in the qualifying school on Friday. Longbella, a McDonell graduate and former University of Minnesota golfer, finished three under par with a score of 281. Longbella's score placed him eighth in a field of 116. He is now qualified to play in the 2023 Sunshine Tour.
Longbella played to a win earlier this year in the first stage of the qualifying school. He headed back to the United States for a while, before returning to South Africa. Chilean golfer Matias Calderon won the Qualifying school played at Heron Banks Golf and River Estate in Vaalpark of Sasolburg, South Africa.
Sturgeons defeat Cavs in opener
Jim Falls got past the Eau Claire Cavaliers 9-8 on Sunday in the first game of the Chippewa River Baseball League season.
The Sturgeons won in comeback fashion. The Cavaliers scored seven times in the top of the seventh to take an 8-3 lead. But Jim Falls rallied with six runs in the bottom half, taking the lead on a bases-loaded walk by Ravin Keyeski.
The game in Jim Falls was the only contest of five on the schedule that didn't get postponed due to weather.
Goldbach hits walk-off HR
Eau Claire North needed a big hit against Wisconsin Rapids on Friday. Janaya Goldbach provided one.
Goldbach blasted a walk-off homer over the center field fence, giving the Huskies softball team a 1-0 win over the Red Raiders. The home run came with two outs in the bottom of the seventh inning.
North split the doubleheader, with Wisconsin Rapids taking the other game 9-5.
Cards break old record
Chippewa Falls' Taylor Mosher, Olivia Sedlacek, Emma-lyn Stephenson and Brooklyn Sandvig broke a school record that stood for 36 years in the 4x400 meter relay on Friday.
The quartet ran a time of 51.38 seconds at the Rice Lake Invitational, breaking the record of 51.84 seconds set 36 years ago.
Abes win MACC Fund Invitational
The Eau Claire Memorial boys golf team won the MACC Fund Invitational, shooting a collective 307 on Saturday in Oconomowoc.
Parker Etzel and Will Schlitz tied for second for Memorial. Both carded a 75. Cole Fisher was seventh with a 78 and Ben Christenson took ninth with a 79.
The tournament was a fundraiser for the Midwest Athletes Against Childhood Cancer Fund.
Blackhawks pitch no-hitter
Keegan Yohnk and Zeke Strand combined to pitch a no-hitter in the Bloomer baseball team's 16-0 win over Cadott on Friday.
Yohnk pitched four hitless innings and struck out 11 before Strand closed out the no-hitter in the fifth.
Brenner hits for cycle
Stanley-Boyd softball player Emily Brenner hit for the cycle in the Orioles' 16-4 win over Regis on Friday.
Brenner was 4 for 5 with a single, double, triple and home run. She drove in five runs and scored four times herself. Emme Felmlee added four hits for the Orioles.
Abes unbeaten at home quad
The Eau Claire Memorial boys tennis team won all three duals at its home quad over the weekend.
The Old Abes beat Buffalo (Minn.) 4-3, Sun Prairie 5-2 and Brookfield Central 4-3. Seth Roosevelt and Ariya Natarajan both went 3-0 in singles, and the doubles team of Grant Johnson and Ben Roberts also went unbeaten.
