Good morning! I'm Marian Studer!
And I'm Angie Kohlhaas! Welcome to the "Bear Facts"! Happy Saint Patrick's Day from all of us at Bishop Garrigan High School.
The biggest event of this weekend is the state individual speech
contest, which is down in Carroll today. Garrigan has twenty entries at state speech. Things will start off right about now, with Amanda Freking presenting her literary program on "Home". Later this morning Autumn Thompson will perform in Public Address, Keshar Nadkarni will present her poetry selection, and Garrigan's lone freshman, Amber Golwitzer, will persent her prose piece, "The Waltz". Then Angie Kohlhaas will perform in Literary Program, Steve Kellner will compete in Radio News Announcing, and Bob Brandenburg will present his After-Dinner Address on "What's Wrong with Parents".
After lunch Nicole Elbert and Amanda Freking will perform in Storytelling. Then Angie Kohlhaas will present her Acting selection, and Chris Kohlhaas and David Murphy will compete in Improvisational Acting. Later on Rebecca McGuire will present and After-Dinner selection about wives of band directors; while Sarah Schmitt, Michael Loebach, and Bob Brandenburg all perform in Acting. Then Mandy Rahm will present a poetic re-telling of "The Three Little Pigs" and Jennifer Faber will read her prose piece about the "Scooby Doo/X Files Conspiracy". The final entries of the day are Janet Kramer in Prose and Marian Studer in Poetry.
Everyone who competes at state is already a winner. They've all already received Division "I" ratings at state. Today they'll compete against the best speech entries from all over northwest Iowa. We hope most will get "I"s and that at least one or two will receive an "Outstanding Performer" nomination and be able to perform at All-State next month. Good luck, speech contestants!
The Golden Bear basketball teams recently held their awards pot-lucks. The girls' team tied for first place in the North Central Conference, with an overall record of 17 wins and only 7 losses. They were near the top of the conference in free throw and three-point percentage. Ashley Arndorfer was a unanimous selection for first team all-conference, and she also made the second team all state. Michelle Vitzthum and Heather Stence also got all-conference awards.
The Bears set new records for free throw percentage. All the varsity players earned letters. Ashley and Sara Reding were named the team MVPs. Jenna Becker, Mindy Buscher, and Shelley DeVries were the most improved players. Sara, Heather, and Ashley shared the "Miss Hustle" award, while Sara and Ashley tied for the Dedication award. The Coaches Apreciation Award was split by Sara, Ashley, Kelly Kohlhaas, Heather Fickbohm, Amanda Gisch, and Janel Richter. Finally, Ashley, Jenna, Janel, Nettie McGuire, and Nicole Reding were named the team co-captains.
The Golden Bear boys also had a great season, with the same 17-7 record as the girls, and they were ranked tops offensively in the North Central Conference-with an average of 73 points per game. Brad Nelson was a unanimous first team all-conference selection, while Scott McGuire, Ben Richter, and Ben Lickteig also received all-conference honors. Brad Nelson set four records this season. He overwhelmingly broke the career scoring record, with a new total of 1,882 points, and he also leads in career assists and steals. To top that off, Brad now holds every three-point record at Garrigan-with records of 8 treys in a game, 85 in a season, and 249 for his career.
Brad shared the prestigious Steve McCall award with Ben Lickteig. Ben Richter and Josh Hanig won the Hustle award. Tim Kohlhaas was named Most Improved Player, Scott McGuire was Offensive Player of the Year, and Justin Fickbohm was Devensive Player of the Year. All those guys lettered, as did Joe Bartolo and Jeff Vaske; managers Dan Besch, Kevin Kohlhaas, and Jake Rahm; and statisticians Tanya Broesder and Andi Kramer. Congratulations to all the basketball award-winners!
This week's Senior Spotlight shines on Drew Hellman and Justin Froehlich. Here with the details is Lynn Kohlhaas.
Drew Hellman is probably best known for his accomplishments in music. He's a four-year choir member who was king on the madrigal royal court last Christmas. Drew takes a challenging schedule with classes like Math V and Physics. He'll be off to college next year, and we wish him all the best.
Justin Froehlich has made even more three-pointers in a game than Brad Nelson. Unfortunately, Justin's games were in intramurals, so it's not quite the same sort of record. Justin is an Algona native whose biggest activity is golf. He also plans to go to college next year, and we wish him good luck!
Thanks, Lynn! On this week's Golden Bear calendar, there's the state speech contest today in Carroll. Then tomorrow intramural basketball continues.
Tuesday in religion classes we'll have a speaker on vocations, and we'll have a special mass for vocations on Wednesday.
Thursday a group of Garrigan students will be donating blood when the Bloodmobile is at Algona High. That afternoon we'll have a special assembly for registration, and that night is the annual Academic Banquet.
Thursday night a group of health students will leave for Des Moines for the State HOSA competition. Then Friday and Saturday it's time for the spring play, as the curtain goes up on the murder mystery "Ten Little Indians".
That's the "Bear Facts" for another week. Thanks for listening, and be sure to catch us again next week when we'll be bringing you more news from Bishop Garrigan High School.
