alexandriacardinals

[From the archives, February 17, 2006, and with apologies to the semi-final and championship games of 2008, and reprinted without permission from the Class of ’65 blog site (following, which, incidentally, is a good resource for all things Alexandria)]:

http://www.65roundup.blogspot.com/

WHAT A NIGHT!  (Or how the cub reporter learned, at the age of 58, he can still jump (though, granted, not very high)).

By Tom Obert
Cub Columnist

[Senior Co-captain Brittney Bruzek holding trophy, Co-captain Ahna Olson at her feet.]

Approximately half way through the SECOND overtime last night, Sara Toft, who with twin sister Andrea was also celebrating her 18th birthday, scored the winning goal to beat Totino-Grace, 3 – 2, to win the section 2, class A, girls hockey championship at the MAC in St. Cloud. The Cardinals will now make their 3rd consecutive appearance in the state tournament at the Xcel Center next weekend (I believe their games will be Friday and Saturday).

[Sara (19) and Andrea (44) Toft, on their 18th birthdays, talk with Echo Press photographer Arlan Anderson – in the background, Dave Harris (in red) interviews Coach Mitch Loch.]

The setup: All week long, Cardinal sports announcer Dave Harris had been creating unnecessary angst for cub reporter-in-training Bob Annen by telling him Totino was awesome. They had two college division 1 prospects – a tall, fast center who proved to be every bit as good as advertised, and a defenseman who appeared to be about 6’9″ and who never came off the ice. Of course, all this fed the pre-conceived notions of we outstate Minnesotans that the camel hair coat, cashmere sweater metro-area private schools (description by cub reporter-in-training and past Honeywell executive, though the cub reporter himself will admit to a similar bias) “employ” mercenaries on all their athletic teams against our home-grown, pinked-cheeked, apple pie and lemonade kids.

Nevertheless, the omens all week appeared to be good. Our girls basketball team won on a night the Alexandria Aces performed at halftime, the boys swimming and diving team completed an undefeated season with the conference championship, our boys basketball team beat Rocori (the No. 2 ranked team in the state) and won again Thursday, and our boys hockey team won at St. Cloud Tech (no minor accomplishment). This cub reporter felt good about our prospects.

On the advice of Mr. Harris, our caravan departed for the game wearing the same attire as had been worn for the semi-final game and with the idea of obtaining the same seats (which we did).

The moms told us before the game that the girls were very nervous – trying to get back to the state tournament for the 11 seniors with their best team. Probably because of that nervousness, they seemed very tight through most of the first period and were probably lucky to escape that period with a scoreless tie.

The pace picked up in the second period and Alex emerged with a 2 – 1 lead, with goals by one of the Toft sisters and Ashley Holmes, heading into the final period. The Cards maintained that lead well into the third period when they were hit with a “frivolous” (that isn’t the word we used at the time, but this is family friendly blog site) too many men on the ice penalty. Totino took advantage of that power play to score the tying goal. Nevertheless, throughout the game and the two overtime periods, sophomore Danielle Justice was spectacular in goal.

The first overtime, and then the second, exhausted players and spectators alike.   [Annen noted that even Abby Williams was sitting between shifts.  The only other time we had seen that was in game where she played sick.]  When Sara finally scored the winning goal, bedlam broke out on the ice and in the stands. The cub reporter, in a total failure at maintaining professional dignity, found himself jumping up and down with and hugging classmate Bud Bruzek, and high-fiving parents all around. The girls on the ice collapsed in the corner in a pile of jubilation and tears. The cub reporter regrouped to try to capture as much of this as he could on film.

[Right after the game – Ruthie, in spite of her Hoosier basketball genes, has become quite the fan, and with Vivian, does all the cheers and belts out the Cardinal fight song.]

We returned to Alex driven by the cub reporter-in-training, who initially thought it would be a grand idea (well, all of us did), to follow the Alex buses home. The buses got lost somewhere in a St. Cloud subdivision, but we eventually found our way home by midnight. The cub reporter and Ruthie were dropped at Mom Obert’s to pick up their car where we discovered the following note stuck on the windshield by Mom: “What a game! Go Cardinals!  I guess the refs were terrible, but WE WON!” Apparently Mr. Harris was expressing some exasperation about the officiating over the air (probably something to do with our paranoia over metro-area favoritism). Abby William’s mom told us during the game that she was going to write a letter to someone in authority – she was quite upset that Abby was tripped, tackled, and otherwise maimed throughout the game without any penalities being called. But . . . we won and will move on.

[“Baby Bruiser” at the state tournament a week later.]

(and other stuff)

The following is a compendium from the Trumm files of the girls’ basketball games against Little Falls (Cards in home black) on January 21 and at Detroit Lakes (Cards in visitor white) on January 22. We have previously chronicled the results of both games. This will mostly be a photo essay (with some captions) of those games, as well as stuff from the copious Obert archives.

Girls just wanna have fun:

Pre-game warm-ups (Alexandria Aces?):

(Lauren]

[Alli]

[Joie]

[Alli and Sam]

[Alli]

[Joie]

Fandom access:

[The suspects somehow managed to elude security and obtained access without passing through the full body scanner.  Nelson, fully aware of his culpability, is rumored to be exiting the state anon.]

Family:

[This is offered as an unnecessary break from the Trumm files, which will follow-on.]  Well, it is a family-oriented blog dedicated to sports and the arts.  Having been accomplished at neither, I will introduce family here.  Little Brother Cam, already a diplomaed alumnus of the University of South Carolina, has decided to re-enter college at the ripe young age of 56.  Specifically, Century College in the Cities.  Good for him, we say.  Long past his athletic prime, we feature him here at a lithe 6’3″ going in for a dunk (yes, he could) at Donaldson Run Park in Arlington, Virginia (in keeping with blog traditions, he was a Cardinal until the 5th-grade).  Now, in his own words, he follows his son, Michael John, into the thespian arts (Michael shown here (trenchcoat on the left) as Nick Tickle, an Irondale High School production).

“Yippee!  I got notified this morning by the director that I made it past the first audition and have been asked to come back Saturday for another round of reading. Now, I’m getting a little nervous! The Century College drama department is doing the stage production of Chekhov’s The Seagull. I hope I can secure the role of Dorn, the retired Doctor. I guess my biggest worry is, what if I get chosen? Oh well, I hope it works. I’ll be proud to follow in my son’s footsteps in the world of the stage! Wish me luck!!!!  Thanks.”

The Cardinal boys’ basketball team recovered nicely last night after their disheartening loss at Fergus over the weekend. They hosted a young (and upcoming) Sartell Sabre team and came away with a workmen like 60-51 victory. Seniors Parker Giroux (No. 5 on scoreboard) and Dan Gorghuber (No. 41) led the way for the Cards with over 20 points each. It was the last game for what surely must be the last of the snowbirds – Gretchen and Don Nelson are off to California this week. The Hoymsters were also at the game – as well as Luella and Otto, of course.

[Cards score.]

[Gorghuber inbounds to Giroux.]

Sitting at the game with Don (who played for Wheaton in the mid-50’s), Dennis Kalpin, and Tom Anderson, we reminisced about the good ole days, as good ole guys are wont to do. I brought up the name of Hal Haskins, by all accounts Alex’s best ever basketball player, who pre-dated us all. So I found a couple of websites highlighting Mr. Haskins career, including being a 2nd-round draft choice of the Minneapolis Lakers (was it during the Haskins’ era that Luella and Otto took a cab from Alex to Williams Arena for the state tournament?):

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hal_Haskins

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1948_NCAA_Men’s_Basketball_All-Americans

http://www.hamline.edu/hamline_info/athletics/mens_basketball/records.html

http://www.basketball-reference.com/teams/MNL/1950_transactions.html

[Gorghuber at the line – Cards made their free throws down the stretch.]

[The “supervisor” at IU – she’ll get me for this!]

Driving home after the game, the Cardinal boys’ hockey game at Willmar was on the radio. Dave Harris announced the girls’ hockey team had beaten Willmar earlier, 4-1, ending their long winless streak. Wa-hoo! Claire Illies had two goals (was shooting hoops with her mom earlier that day, doing my background research*), and Alia Kopischke and Rachel Finley also scored. Dave announced the swimming and gymnastics teams also won that night. So, now it was up to the boys’ hockey team – it was 2-2 in the 3rd period when this reporter called it a night. This morning I learned they lost 4-2 – those other Cardinals are in 2nd place in the conference.

[Original girls hockey team – from Victoria Heights on the ice behind old Central High School, c. 1960]

[Still searching for an ID here – don’t know the source of the photo (except it was in the Obert family archives), but it appears to be Noonan’s Park, c. 1950’s?]

The staff photographer has posted his doings from several venues. They will be the subjects of a follow-on article.

[* Continuing a recent hot streak, this reporter made 10, then 18 free throws in a row, and is thus considering teaching a continuing education class in that regard – fingertips, stroke, follow through along the intended flight path, and hope it ends up within the vicinity of the basket.]

[Harkening back to July 23, 2010 – the Alexandria premier of this movie starring Alexandria native son, John Hawkes. We now know, as many of us predicted at the time, the movie has been nominated for an Oscar as best picture and John has been been nominated as best supporting actor (I hate to be picky, but I thought his was a lead role!). As this is also an all purposes arts and entertaiment blog, here is our report at the time.]

There was a luncheon meet and greet at Alex’s Cinema 9 today. Alexandria’s own, John Hawkes, was here to present his new movie – Winter’s Bone – before a sold out house. The movie won the Sundance Film Festival – John played Teardrop, the 2nd leading role in the movie, behind the 18-year old lead actress, Jennifer Lawrence, and they both were terrific. It’s a very dark movie about meth producers in the Ozarks. When asked if there is an Oscar buzz, he said certainly Jennifer would be considered – but I suspect he will be too. He, as he noted himself, is a rather slender, unintimidating guy, but his character on the screen will give you pause. After the showing at Sundance, he said Nicole Kidman asked him to be in her next movie. His biggest box office movie where he had a major role is probably The Perfect Storm. But he said Winter’s Bone is his best role. Though he has made many movies, maybe this one will make him a household name at age 50.

Here are photos of pre-movie stop-and-chats with him. At the end of the movie he took questions from the audience for about 45 minutes. He was very good at that I thought – gave wonderful explanations about the making of the movie. Ruthie got a signed poster for grandson Tom.

The Alex class of ’77 is pretty impressive: Mr. Hawkes; Tom Lehman; and John Hammergren, the CEO of McKesson, Inc., the largest health care company in the world!

[A response to the above from friends in San Antonio.]

Tom,

Sandy and I saw Winter’s Bone over a week ago and I REALLY liked it. Our local critic gave it 4 stars. So your e-mail is very timely for us.

Dick

[A response to the response.]

Interesting stuff (well, to me) – John said they fought hard to have the movie made in the Ozarks (rather than, say, Vancouver, where it would have been cheaper). They went house to house in the two counties where it was shot, explaining to individual homeowners what they wanted to do and if it was OK. The house where the main character, Ree, lived with her family is the actual house where the young girl who plays her little sister lives in real life! In the scenes where she is looking in the closet at her father’s clothes, those are the clothes of the real life father who lives there. He said about 40% of the characters in the movie are locals, not professional actors. He guessed the movie, which was made in 23 days (rather than the usual 90) probably only cost about $1 1/2 million to make – incredibly cheap in this day and age.

[John meets the supervisor; John’s mom, Pat Perkins, exits stage left.]

[The actor and Mrs. Alexandria.]

From the Echo Press:

http://www.echopress.com/event/article/id/81759/

http://www.echopress.com/event/article/id/81739/group/Opinion/