The Bear Facts

August 30, 2003


Good morning! I'm Scott Stence!

And I'm Brooke Myers! You're listening to the "Bear Facts". Thanks for joining us as we begin our twelfth season here on KLGA, bringing you the news from Bishop Garrigan High School.

The Golden Bear baseball team had an awesome summer. While they started off slow, things came together in the second half of the season. They ended up winning their sixth North Central Conference championship in ten years, as well as taking the district championship and advancing just one game away from state. Ben Geelan and Aaron O'Kane were this year's team MVPs. Both were also named to the Iowa Newspaper Association's All-State team. Brent Shillington joined Aaron and Ben on the All-District team, and those three were joined by Jason Lallier, Joe Hellman, Alex Vaske, Andrew Thilges, and Jon Hanig for All-Conference honors.

Brent Shillington was named the Bears' Most Valuable Pitcher, a new award created this year. Jason Lallier and Joe Hellman won offensive honors, while Alex Vaske and Jon Hanig were tops on defense. Tim Richter was the Most-Improved Player, and Andrew Thilges and Matt Vitzthum won the Bear Pride Award. Other baseball letterwinners include Dan Garman, Gacvin Freking, Bill Vaske, Tim Arndorfer, Grant Smith, and Jeff Lappe. Congratulations to the baseball team on another great season!

The Bishop Garrigan softball team also won the district championship. Chelsie Wood and Emily DeWaard won second team all-conference honors, while Lisa Even and Jenni Erpelding were honorable mentions. Chelsie and Jenni split Most Valuable Player honors, and Emily was named "Big Stick".

Lisa Even earned the Hustle Award, and she split the Golden Glove award with Maria Kohlhaas. Molly Black won the Coach's Award and split "Big Mouth" with Rose Mayer. Kelly Schmidt was named Most Improved Player. Alison Brandenburg, Nicole Reding, and Ashley Waller also lettered. Congratulations on a fine season to the softball team!

The Garrigan quiz bowl team also had a big summer. John Kohlhaas, Matt Courtney, Mike Blocker, David Murphy, Jeff Hellman, and Steven Kellner went to St. Louis last June to compete in the National Academic Championships. Garrigan got one victory at state, and they played two other close games against teams that made the play-offs. John and Matt are back at Garrigan this fall, and they will be among the core players for this year's quiz bowl team.

One other Garrigan student who had a successful summer was junior Sean Kohlhaas. Sean went to the state fair earlier this month and ended up showing the grand champion market heifer. Sean's heifer sold at auction for $10,000-an amount that supports college scholarships for 4-H livestock exhibitors. Congratulations, Sean Kohlhaas!

School is barely started, but we're already looking forward to Homecoming. This year's celebration will be September 15 - 19. The theme is "A Five-Day Trip Around the World", with the decorations featuring points of interest from all over everywhere. Last Wednesday the senior class nominated this year's Homecoming royal court. This year's king candidates are Adam Arndorfer, Josh Broesder, Aaron O'Kane, Colby Reding, and Scott Stence. The queen candidates are Molly Black, Maria Erpelding, Ashley McGuire, Michaela Mescher, and Melissa Vaske. Congratulations, everybody!

For the past eleven years, we've started our Senior Spotlight each year by featuring our student council presidents. We're keeping up that tradition this year by spotlighting John Kohlhaas and Eric Cassmann.  Here to tell you about them is Cassie Recker.

John Kohlhaas is in just about every activity there is at Garrigan. He's in cross-country, track, intramurals, quiz bowl, band, choir, the "Bear Facts", large-group and individual speech, publications, drama, Christian leadership, student council, and the math team. He even says that if there were a school hacky-sack team, he'd be part of that. Away from school he manages to find time to work as an announcer here on KLGA. John plans to attend a private college next year, and we wish him all the best.

Our other student council co-president is Eric Cassmann. Eric is in pretty much all the same activities that John is-which means he's also a very busy person. When he's not busy with school work or activities, Eric works at Premier Pizza in Algona. He says he'll go to college and then get a master's degree and then a doctorate-so we guess he'll continue to keep busy after high school. Good luck to both John and Eric!

On our Golden Bear calendar this week, there's a volleyball scrimmage today at Clarion, and several musicians are at an all-state camp at Drake University. Monday we have the day off for Labor Day.

Tuesday cross-country season begins, with the first meet at Mason City Newman. That night the volleyball team hosts Estherville Lincoln Central. Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday we'll have try-outs for the fall play, 13th Past Midnight.

Wednesday night there's a meeting for freshmen in the confirmation program. Then on Friday we'll have First Friday adoration in the Garrigan chapel. The football team has next Friday off, but on Saturday the volleyball team plays at Algona High.

That's our first "Bear Facts" of the season. Thanks for tuning in, and be sure to join us again next week for more news from Bishop Garrigan High School.


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