Sports & Outdoors

By Katya Gordon Every single THHS athlete that competed in the state track meet on June 8-9 reached the podium in a historic team showing.… Login to continue reading Login…

By Forrest Johnson A tough Moose Lake-Willow River softball squad ended the Silver Bay season last Thursday at Braun Park in Cloquet with a 5-0… Login to continue reading Login…

“Extraordinary” is the word that comes to mind for this year’s Two Harbors Track season, which began last season with the loss of longtime coach Dan Hebl for the distance runners, and continued this spring with a historically wet, snowy spring. Yet the combination of strong and deep natural talent, the coming together of a new team of coaches, and a heavy dose of grit, hard work, and camaraderie on the part of the athletes, has led to nothing less than a “perfect storm” situation for the Girls team which won both Sub-Sections and Sections meet, and a strong year for the boys as well. With three of the four girls relays (4 x 200, 4 x 400, 4 x 800) far outpacing anyone in Section 7A, their first serious relay competition will come on Thursday and Friday, June 8-9, at the State Track meet at the St. Michael/ Albertville high school. Other first or second place individual finishes, qualifying the runner for the state meet, include:

The weather was the big story on Wednesday, May 24, where eleven teams gathered in Esko to run one of the coldest and windiest sub-section meets in memory. With temperatures in the mid-40s, a spitting rain, and a driving wind that knocked over cones and gusted up to 30 mph, runners faced physical challenges more common in early April than late May. The Agates ran determinedly, however, securing many spots in the Sections Meet which is coming up on June 1 at UMD. The top seven individuals and four relays from each event will go to Sections, which include: Delaney Nelson in the 100m dash, the 200m dash, 4 x 200m relay, and the Long Jump Jenna Marxhausen in the 200m dash, 4 x 200 relay and 4 x 400 relay Trinity Giddings in the 400m run, the 4 x 200m relay and 4 x 400m relay Grace Swanson in the 400m run, the 4 x 400m

The Silver Bay softball squad punched their ticket to the Section 7A finals Thursday against Moose Lake-Willow River with big playoff wins over the past week. “The kids earned it with big wins in the double elimination rounds,” said coach Mike Guzzo. “Our goal was to make it to the championship game. It’s been 14 years since we won a section title.” The Mariners won their opening section game last Tuesday with a 13-2 win over Floodwood at home. Hope Ernest pitched three innings in the win and was 2-3 at the plate with 4 RBIs. Danika Thompson was 3-3 at the plate with 3 RBIs and Berkely Hoff was 2-3 from the batter’s box.

The Two Harbors Trap team has finished their regular competition and awaits the state competition where they will travel to Alexandria to compete in the largest organized shooting event in the country. THHS will shoot on June 13th with about 1,000 other students that day, and overall during the three day event there are expected to be around 8,000 shooters. The top performing male shooter for the regular season was Josh Johnson, and top female shooter was Maria Stellmach. Stellmach also was the most improved shooter overall. Final season results revealed the team finished fifth in the conference out of eight teams, with Josh Johnson and Anders Hastings finishing in the top 20% in a league of 11,289 shooters.

I was feeling a bit of anxiety as I got closer to the BWCA entry point lake last week, the memory of last year’s lingering lake ice firmly in mind. There were patches of snow in the woods, and every blog and report I could find online suggested that some lakes might still hold onto enough ice cover to prevent paddling into the canoe country. That was certainly the case for my son Everett and me last year, as we waited for hours for open water channels to enlarge and connect enough for us to head in, but to no avail. But this year we got lucky, and while there was still ice blocking the landing, we were able to access open water a few hundred yards up the shore and start paddling. The ice had likely gone out during the night. Ice-out is one of my favorite times to be canoe tripping in the backcountry. Especially when it's linked to fishing for lake trout. The land is fresh and the ground appears packed down by the weight of the snow that recently melted. Typically, there are still a few patches of snow lingering in shaded ravines, or ice in rocky crags, to remind one that winter is never far away up here—but nearby the first traces of greenery are emerging from a seven month slumber. There is a tangible excitement in the air, as loons vocalize late into the lingering twilight, happy to have returned to their northern home. Sometimes saw whet owls can be heard all night, their beeping vocalizations sounding like a large truck backing up. Otters ply stream inlets where white suckers spawn, and cow moose tend to their newborn calves on tiny islands. And usually, the mosquitoes and black flies that can bring misery to Man and Beast alike are still a week or two away.