Haberman, Lutmer, Madsen do well on last week’s questions
Last week’s Bleacher Views featured a series of questions concerning area sports history. I had three guys — one with significant help from his wife — participate with several correct answers.
Rick Haberman, who now lives in Tracy where he teaches elementary physical education and coaches both girls’ volleyball and boys’ basketball for the Tracy-Milroy-Balaton Panthers, had a bit of advantage and did the best. Rick, you see, grew up in Heron Lake. Later, he lived and worked in Fulda for several years (teaching physical education and health, along with coaching volleyball and girls’ basketball). So he had knowledge for both of those areas. Plus, Rick wrote sports stories for the Fulda Free Press and did his share of research for his weekly column, “From The Cheap Seats.”
Jim and Diane Lutmer from Adrian and Mike Madsen from Heron Lake (maybe Diana helped him, too — but she grew up in Lakeville) also correctly answered a bunch of the questions.
Here, again, are the questions with the right answers.
Who did the 1995 Fulda Raiders beat in the finals to win the Section 3A championship? Rick says it was Russell-Tyler-Ruthton and it was brutally cold that November night at Alex Fisher Field in Fulda. Rick was correct.
Two Minnesota high school coaching legends had brief stops in Slayton before becoming famous elsewhere later. One was Duane Baglien who coached the Wildcats in basketball for two seasons in the 1950’s (’52-53 and ’53-54) before moving on to Fergus Falls and Edina. The other was Ron Stolski who coached football at SHS for one season (1964) before moving on to Princeton and Park Center. He eventually settled at Brainerd where he began his legendary career in 1975 and became the president of the Minnesota Football Coaches Association President, along with once holding the state record for wins as a head football coach in Minnesota with an amazing overall record of 380-171-5 (.688) in a remarkable total of 56 seasons!
Stolski currently ranks seconds on the all-time list, just behind Verndale’s Mike Mahlen (382-121-3 in 49 seasons for a winning percentage of .758). Adrian’s Randy Strand is 27th on the all-time list with a stellar record of 238-112 (.680) in 33 seasons in charge of the Dragons, including four Prep Bowl runner-up finishes. Interesting that the Dragons never played to a tie in Randy’s 33 years as the head coach.
Darwin Gonnerman, the “star” of the 1965 Trojan Relays as a thrower, sprinter and jumper, was a standout football player at Adrian High School and South Dakota State University before playing in the CFL for the Winnipeg Blue Bombers, who were earlier coached by Bud Grant (who had also played for Winnipeg).
After leading the Fulda Raiders to the 1975 District 8 and Region 2 basketball championships, Arvid Kramer played collegiate basketball at Augustana in Sioux Falls and then played professionally in Europe for several years. After that Arvid settled in Southern California and operated basketball camps and schools. All three —Rick, Jim and Mike — got that one right!
Jim and Rick both knew that Adrian won the District 8 boys’ basketball championship in 1985 and was defeated by Ceylon in the first round of the Region 2 Tournament. They also both knew that it was Sam Lynn who, as a freshman, tossed in a miraculous 60-foot shot which sent Adrian into overtime (against Southwest Star Concept or Heron Lake-Okabena) at Worthington in the 2006 sub-section girls’ basketball quarterfinals. The Dragons won that game and three years later, when Lynn was a senior, Adrian’s girls won the Section 3A championship and played in the state tournament.
Slayton, I believe, won District 8 boys’ basketball titles in both 1950 and 1955. The Wildcats were very tall in 1950. None of the three knew that one. There are banners indicated such on the walls of the Murray County Central gymnasium — where many a great game has been played.
Okabena, led by tall Warren “Lefty” Gentry, had a great basketball season in 1941 before Jackson stopped the Bluehawks in the District 7 finals. Both Rick and Mike knew about Lefty!
Twenty years later, Okabena became 19-1 with a stunning 75-44 victory over perennial power Mountain Lake in the District 7 semifinals. None of the three got that one.
Twenty-fours later, the Heron Lake-Okabena Scarlet Knights — coached by Loren Marschel (Jim, Mike and Rick all got that one correct) — defeated Jackson to win its only district title and defeated St. Clair (Rick, Jim and Mike were all right on with that one, too!) in the regional semifinals. Ceylon, which earlier ended Adrian’s fine ’85 season, nipped HL-O for a state-tournament berth in the championship game.
And the last question, took both Rick and Mike a few tries but they finally got it — Dave Johnson (OHS, 1961) and son Todd Johnson (HL-O, 1985) were the father-son combination that each played in a District 7 championship game (against Jackson at Worthington) with different results.
Adding them up, Rick had eight correct answers. Mike had seven correct and Jim (and Diane) also had the right answers to seven of the questions. I am guessing that there were other readers who knew a few, but opted not to participate. I will have to come up with some kind of a “prize” the next time I type up a quiz like this!
It’s now the middle of December and soon the days will stop getting shorter and we can begin anticipating the slightly longer days of January. But remember, the old saying “as the days grow longer, the cold grows stronger.” For now, however, we do have a few warmer days this week. Get out and support your local high school team. Those student-athletes are working hard as they strive to compete and provide fans with plenty of entertaining action in the comfortable atmosphere of area high school gymnasiums.
