Sports from the week of October 15, 2003

Cross country title is eighth straight

The Panther girls' cross-country program continued its dominance in the 212 Conference by winning the conference title for the 8th straight year Friday.

Tracy/Milroy/Balaton's winning 31 points were followed by YME 42, BOLD 49, ACGC 88.

Panther sophomore Jillian Tholen was the individual champion. Teammate Stephanie Kaup came through the chute just four seconds behind Tholen for second-place honors. Kaup is a senior.

Tholen's win marked the eighth-consecutive year that a Panther has won the conference race. Either Leah or Julie Gifford won the race for four-straight years. Kristin Sweetman won it the last three years.

Tholen winning time was 16:20. Other Panther varsity runners were: 2) Steph Kaup, 16:24; 7) Rebecca Gervais, 17:01; 12) Jenna Schaar, 17:36; 14) Julia Olson, 17:46; 17)Dani Jones, 18:15; 22) Johanna Schmidt, 18:57.

Coach Steve Jones said that both Tholen and Kaup ran excellent races. Tholen won, the coach indicated, despite being recently diagnosed with "mono." He said she is expected to miss the rest of the season.

He noted that several other runners are hampered with injuries.

"However, they have worked hard and performed well so far this season."

• • •

The Section 3A cross country meet is scheduled Thursday, Oct. 23, at Adrian. The top-two teams in both boys' and girls' competition qualify for the state cross-country meet Nov. 1 at St. Olaf.

Canby/Minneota/Lincoln HI and Jackson County Central are the favored girls' teams.

Season ends for TMB football

Early lead doesn't hold at Granite

The Panther football team lost to Yellow Medicine East Tuesday night at Granite Falls 33-13

The loss eliminated Tracy/Milroy/Balaton from a spot in the playoffs. The Panther ended their season with a 1-7 record, 1-4 in the 212 Conference.

"We are in the playoffs now," Panther Coach Randy McIntire had said before the game. "A loss and we go home. A win and a Renville County West loss would put us in the playoffs and we can keep playing."

The Panthers got the loss by RCW as ACGC beat them 13-7 but could not get the win over YME.

"We could not stop their running game," said McIntire after the game. "We made some adjustments at the half and did better in the second half but it wasn't enough.

TMB rolls over Springfield

Undisputed 212 title sought Thursday

The Tracy/Milroy/Balaton volleyball team improved their season record to 13-12 with a 3-0 win over the Springfield Tigers at Tracy Monday night 3-0.

The game scores were 25-7, 25-13 and 25-14.

Tessa Nelson led the Panther offense with 6 kills to go along with her 2 blocks and 16/16 serving with 6 aces. Kasey Loeslie had 5 kills, 2 digs and was 17/17 serving with 3 aces (she put up 9 straight points as she led off serving in the opening game).

Emily Miller had 4 kills, Laura Lanoue had 3 digs, Andrea VanMoer 1 dig, Emily Scharfe 1 block and Nicole Haecherl 1 block. Krysta Tholen had 17 set assists and was 15/16 serving with a match high 7 aces. The Panthers served aggressively, registering 20 aces.

The B-squad won 2 games to none and the C-squad split four games to finish 2-2.

TMB travels to Prinsburg Thursday night seeking the undisputed conference championship. The Panthers are 6-0 in the conference. Central Minnesota Christian School is 5-1.

TMB takes No. 1 seed into north half tourney

The Panther volleyball team has been seeded No. 1 in the Section 3AA North Volleyball Tournament.

The Section 3AA North teams are: 1) TMB, 2) MVL, 3) RCW, 4) GFW, 5) YME, 6) BOLD, 7) Redwood Valley, 8) Canby.

The Panthers will begin section play at 6 p.m. Friday, Oct. 24 in Redwood Falls against Canby. The winner of that match will meet the winner of YME vs GFW at 6 p.m. Tuesday, Oct. 28 and the championship match will be at 7:30 on Thursday, Oct. 30. The winner of the North Section will meet the winner of the South Section, for the right to advance to the state tournament, at SMSU 5:30 p.m. Nov. 1.

Teams in the South Section are 1) JCC, 2) Windom, 3) Pipestone, 4) St James, 5) MCC, 6) Luverne, 7) MCW, 8)) LC-WM, 9) Springfield.