I noticed a new fad at Thursday’s Missota Conference Championship track and field meet at Tiger Stadium – giant umbrellas. When I was in grade school, our track coaches would tell us to find a shady spot under a tree when we had a couple hours between races. My high school team became seemingly the last one in the country to get its own tent when my dad finally bought one in the late 90s.

Now every athlete seems to have their own tent-sized umbrella. A quick Googling of “sports umbrella” reveals that there is, apparently, a huge market for these things. This product, which didn’t exist for the last 6 billion years or so, is now essential if you’re planning on spending more than 45 minutes outside.

Check these jumbo umbrellas (I call them Jum-Brellas) out…

The Farmington softball team celebrated its status as Farmington’s winningest spring sports team as it honored its seniors Thursday night against Red Wing. Paige Lindrud, Dani Muelken and Alyssa Hagen had their numbers written on the outfield walls in red Dixie Cups for their final regular season game in Farmington.

Farmington senior Zach Wyatt sports a hat he got at the Global Market in Minneapolis during Thursday’s chilly outdoor meet in Rosemount. Wyatt’s one word to describe his fashion statement: “Warm”

I was listening to the AM 1500 broadcast of the Twins-Orioles game a couple of nights ago on my drive home from work. Baltimore’s Vlad Guerrero was batting and, as a conversation starter, one of the Twins broadcasters asked color man Dan Gladden if he thought Guerrero was a future Hall of Famer. Gladden immediately responded, “No” as if there were no case to be made for Vlad, and that the mere idea of him in Cooperstown was an insult to those already enshrined there.

That kind of bothered me, just like it does when Gladden calls Jim Thome “Jim Toe-May”. And it got me thinking, which active offensive players will one day be Hall of Famers. More specifically, which ones have already built their cases and if they retired today, would make it in. Here’s the list I came up with. Be sure to comment if you think I’ve made any glaring omissions…

1. Ichiro Suzuki
2. Albert Pujols
3. Chipper Jones
4. Derek Jeter
5. Vlad Guerrero
6. Jim Thome
7. Omar Visquel
8. Pudge Rodriguez

Others on the fringe, but with a bit more to prove: Todd Helton, Joe Mauer

Would be in if not for the roids: A-Roid and Manny

Here’s a youtube video of Farmington senior running back CJ Record, who topped 1,000 yards for the Tigers last fall:

Hello again, everybody. The vast wasteland that is late-March prep sports in Minnesota is finally over and I’m back with a renewed commitment to keeping this blog fresh with new information for your viewing pleasure. Here are some pictures of the boys and girls swimming teams celebrating their successful seasons…

Farmington swimmers Kaitlyn O'Reilly, Tyler Magalis and Brian Huls attended last Friday's All-State banquet along with girls coach Jen Marshall (nominated for Class 2A Coach of the Year) and boys assistant Gregg Rappe (Assistant Coach of the Year). Elizabeth Wolfe was also an all-stater on the girls side.

 

The boys swimming and diving team and coach Ryan Hamen had fun taking down all the records they broke during the 2010-11 season.

All-Independent Team – Winter 2010-11

1. Tyler Magalis, boys swimming and diving

2. Krystal Baumann, girls hockey

3. Carl Elmer, wrestling

4. Taylor Meyer, girls basketball

5. Brian Huls, boys swimming and diving

6. Kiana Lord, gymnastics

7. Hannah Alexander, girls hockey

8. Nadia Lorencz, gymnastics

9. Tyler Grubb, boys hockey

10. Jordan Bridges, girls basketball

Top five most memorable performances

1. Led by Magalis’ state dive title, boys swimming and diving places 14th state meet

2. Girls hockey advances past Lakeville North in three-overtime thriller

3. Girls basketball clinches share of first Missota Conference title

4. Gymnastics team sets team, individual records against Northfield

5. Boys hockey wins first game at Red Wing in a decade to clinch first .500 season since 2005-06

In today’s Star Tribune column, Sid Hartman calls Minnesota Twins outfielder Michael Cuddyer “the outstanding all-around player”.

Maybe if you don’t factor in his mediocre speed, batting average and power, his poor range and his league-leading double play totals.

You could maybe give Cuddyer an “outstanding” on his arm, that’s one out of five tools. Generally, to be an “outstanding all-around player” you’d have to be really good at all five tools. Cuddyer is not even close to that. If he hits 20 HR with 90 RBIs this year I’d be thrilled, and that’s far from outstanding.

Sure, he’s a nice guy, and he knows magic tricks, but two really good years out of what, eight? Save me the “outstanding all-around player” stuff.

Link to Sid’s column:

http://www.startribune.com/sports/twins/118750874.html

I think spring is the toughest time to be a high school coach because…

…there are so many kids out for spring sports. I can’t imagine the amount of organization it must take to run one practice, let alone figure out who can do what events or who is going to compete on varsity, JV or B Squad. 

Today at the high school I watched baseball coach Mike Winters divide 54 baseball players into three groups to rotate between a few defensive stations, seven or eight hitting stations and a pitching station. It looked like a lot of work went into getting all that set up.

 …the weather makes the spring sports season a mess waiting to happen. All the schedules are jammed into a span of about 45 days where it’s likely to be cold, it just might rain and it could even start snowing again. Many of the teams are already scheduled to play three games a week, and an early stretch of bad weather could lead to reschedulings that result in four or five games in a week. 

 Here are some pictures I took at today’s track practice…

Coach Brian Helmstetter talks to the boys team

Coach Tom Hart addresses the girls team

Head boys soccer coach and track assistant Julian Buss somehow got the job of shoveling off the 50 meters of the FHS track still covered by snow. He managed to keep a smile on his face throughout.

A pair of Farmington runners share a laugh - possibly at my expense - during Monday's warm-up jog.

I’m not a great college basketball mind. During the course of the season, I probably watched a dozen Minnesota Gophers games and a handful of Iowa Hawkeyes games from start to finish. With those two teams being quite lousy, I lost interest in the college basketball season pretty quickly. What I gathered from the nightly highlight packages on ESPN is basically this: There is lots of dunking going on, Ohio St., Kansas and Duke are good, and none of the teams are really that good.

I don’t really care about the NCAA Tournament, but I do enjoy statistics. That’s why I’ve created a bracket experiment that will hopefully give me something interesting to keep track of during the barren wasteland that is March sports.

I’ve created three brackets. The first one I filled out like most people do, by picking the teams I think are probably good, throwing in a few random upsets and hoping for the best. Final Four: Ohio State, Duke, Kansas, St. Johns.

The second I filled in by doing a coin flip for all of what I considered to be toss-up games, which was any matchup between any two four-or-worse seeds (Seeds 1 through 3 automatically advanced past the first round). Final Four: Ohio State, Duke, Purdue, Kansas State

The third bracket I just advanced every favorite. Final Four: Ohio State, Duke, Kansas, Pitt

So, by the end of the tournament we’ll be able to see which strategy gave me the best results. And it will give me added motivation to follow a tournament that, in reality, I care nothing about.

Visiting Farmington’s first softball practice of the season at Boeckman Middle School made me feel a bit old and out of touch. It was only 10 years ago that I was playing high school baseball. It doesn’t seem so long ago until you realize that in 2001 I didn’t own a cell phone, there was no Facebook or Youtube and no one wore ankle-length socks (I have the pictures to prove this). 

Anyway, what really blew me away today was that Farmington coach Rob Laden was using video software to film his players’ swings, then instantly compare them on a laptop alongside the swings of major leaguers. Needless to say there were no coaching methods like this at my high school 10 short years ago.

Here are some pictures of an FHS player working on her swing with coach Rob Laden. 

It’s been a long three months, but the end of the winter season is almost in sight. After last night’s boys basketball section loss to Northfield, the girls basketball team is the only team still in action. As I predicted at the midway point of the season, the Tigers are on the verge of qualifying for their first-ever trip to Target Center. I don’t want to jinx coach Jason Berg’s team, but I’m calling for a 23-point margin of victory in tomorrow night’s Section 1AAAA championship game against Rochester Mayo. 

It’s been a busy last two weeks with the girls basketball and girls hockey playoff runs, and state wrestling, state gymnastics and state swimming all going on. I’ve been too busy to blog much, so here’s a rundown of the last couple of weeks in pictures…

Tyler Magalis gives the thumbs up after winning the state 1-meter dive title

Brian Huls was all smiles after capping off his career with three top-10 state finishes

These young fans cheered on birthday girl Isis Alexander during last week's section basketball win over Rochester Century

 

Senior wrestler Carl Elmer finally made it to the podium in his third trip to the X

Magalis had plenty of fans cheering him on at the U of M

The section semifinal game at Tiger Gym also drew a big crowd of Farmington supporters

I’ll cap off our coverage of the winter season with a Top 10 Winter Athletes rundown in the March 24 edition of the Independent. If you have any input you’d like to offer on the top 10 Farmington athletes of the winter season, you can respond here on the blog or drop me an email.

Think Spring!

As an experiment, let’s look at a nameless pitching staff by the numbers and see what you think: One starter went 17-11 last year with seven complete games, another went 14-10 with an ERA under 3.70 and 200 strikeouts, another is 38-22 over the last three years, another is 35-20 over the last three years and another, a potential No. 5 starter, went 10-3 last year while starting just 13 games. And for good measure, there’s a sixth option that has been a .500ish pitcher for the last three years.

This is, of course, the Minnesota Twins pitching staff. So, why do these promising numbers not convince me that the starting rotation isn’t the team’s biggest question mark heading into the 2011 season? Because when they’re attached to the names of the players they belong to, it becomes apparent that all six pitchers, whether because of injuries or past inconsistencies, give fans a season to think they may regress this summer. 

Starting from the top…

Carl Pavano, 11-12, 4.43 ERA, 112 K

Pavano, it was recently announced, will get the opening day start for the  Twins after emerging to win 17 games, complete seven of them, and pitch 221 innings last season. The Twins front office was questioning his durability when they refused to give an injury-proned 35-year-old a three-year deal this off-season. 

It should be noted that Pavano has already matched his career high with two consecutive healthy seasons. From 2003-04 with Florida, Pavano went 30-21 and pitched over 430 innings. Then he pitched 26 games from 2005 to 2008 before his next healthy season with Cleveland and the Twins in 2009 (when he had an ERA of 5.10). I hope he stays healthy over the course of his new two-year deal, I’m just saying Twins fans should keep his injury history in mind and not get their hopes up for another 17-win season, 3.75 ERA season.

Biggest ? mark: Can the 35-year-old have three straight healthy/two straight productive seasons? 

Francisco Liriano, 18-9, 3.72 ERA, 208 K

More than any other Twins starter, I think Liriano is in position to top last year’s production. He wasn’t the benefit of great run support last year when he won just 14 games, so if he even pitches similarly and gets a little more luck he could be an 18-game winner. 

Also, Liriano is pitching for a contract, so he should be plenty motivated in 2011.

Biggest ? marks: Can he overcome big-game jitters? Will spring training shoulder soreness subside? 

Scott Baker, 15-10, 4.30 ERA, 168 K

Baker’s ERA has climbed from 3.45 to 4.37 to 4.49 over the last three seasons. He didn’t pitch well while battling injuries for a large part of last season, but his home runs allowed still went down from 28-23. If he can get through a full season at Target Field healthy, I think he could put up much-improved numbers.

Biggest ? mark: How’s the elbow? 

Kevin Slowey, 11-9, 4.56 ERA, 112 K

Slowey is another fly ball pitcher that, in theory, should continue to benefit from Target Field. Instead, he gave up a career-high 21 home runs last season. Fortunately, he’s that guy in the rotation that always seems to get run support. His career ERA is 4.41, he doesn’t strike out a lot of guys, and his career record – 39-21. I’m going to say some of that luck starts to run out this year.

Biggest ? mark: Can he pitch well enough to win double figure games if the team doesn’t score six a night for him?

Nick Blackburn, 10-12, 4.80 ERA, 77 K

Two straight 11-11 seasons, now make it two straight 10-12 seasons for the sinker-ball specialist. You can be polite and call him an innings eater, but you can’t just ignore the fact that if he does eat up 200 innings, he’ll likely lead  the league in hits allowed. His control (120 walks in three seasons) doesn’t make up for the fact that he can’t strike out anyone, and has allowed 100 more hits than innings pitched in his short career.

Biggest ? mark: Is the real Blackburn this hittable, or can he return to the 4.00 ERA days of 2008-09?

Brian Duensing, 8-5, 16 starts, 38 bullpen appearances, 3.28 ERA

Duensing probably should be starting after going 10-3 in limited starts last season, but I see the Twins going with the five more veteran guys and using the lefty Duensing to fill out their questionable bullpen.

Biggest ? marks: Will he get a shot in the starting rotation? If not, will he continue to be an effective reliever despite his lack of flashy stuff?

 

Meyer sinks a free throw for her 1,000th career point

 

Before I came here in 2007, only three girls had reached 1,000 points in Farmington girls basketball’s history. I got to see Abby Kenealy and Kirstee Rotty join the club over the last few years and Taylor Meyer became the sixth Tiger girl to reach quadruple figures with a free throw early on in Friday’s easy win over Northfield at Tiger Gym.

I didn’t know Meyer was within sight of the milestone until I got to the gym Friday night and saw the signs in the crowd. It actually surprised me that Meyer was approaching 1,000 points, and I mean that entirely as a compliment. When you watch Meyer play, it’s the opposite of watching Kobe Bryant play in the all-star game. She doesn’t pile up points by taking 30 shots in a game, but by playing within herself and waiting for her opportunities to present themselves.

I’ve seen Meyer play plenty of great games where she’s scored 11, nine or even five points, as she did Friday night. That’s because she also rebounds, passes and plays great defense. It’s a shame so much attention goes to the players who score the most points when there are great players like Meyer who not only score, but help their team win in so many other ways.

The Farmington bench reacts to Meyer scoring her 1,000th point

 

The crowd cheers

When you go to seven or eight high school sporting events a week for eight straight years, a lot of them tend to blend together. Very few of the games find their way into your long-term memory.

One of those few unforgettable games was Tuesday night at Ames Arena in Lakeville. Third-seeded Farmington finally got over the hump against second-seeded Lakeville North (ranked 12th in Class 2A) by coming back from two goals down in the third period for a 5-4 victory in three overtimes.

Senior standout Krystal Baumann got beat up by the Panthers all night (I thought checking was illegal in girls hockey, but I guess not), but she toughed out a sprained knee and capped off another hat trick with her third power play goal of the game with about three minutes left in regulation. With the score tied, the teams played through 30 minutes of scoreless sudden-death overtime before Hannah Alexander wristed in the game-winner. 

The biggest hero of the game was goaltender Jessica Erchul, who turned back shot after shot, first to keep the game from getting out of hand, then to keep it tied throughout the overtimes. Erchul, who has an 8-4 career playoff record, finished with a career-best 61 saves.

When Alexander’s shot finally ended the game, the Farmington players and fans went crazy. Several of the Lakeville North players fell to the ice and cried. It’s games like this one – where the stakes are high and the finishes are shocking – that become truly memorable. 

Here are my top five most memorable games since I began covering the Tigers in 2007…

5. Volleyball earns first state tournament trip

 

4. Boys basketball beats Shakopee for first time ever

 

3. Tuesday night’s triple-overtime girls hockey game

2. Football avenges loss to Hutchinson

 

1. Girls hockey upsets Eagan in first round of Class 2A State Tournament

Twinsfest is finally in the books and we’re now just a couple weeks away from pitchers and catchers reporting to spring training. It seems like a good time to post my yearly stat projections for the 2011 season.

1. Denard Span, CF, .280 AVG, .360 OBP, 6 HR, 55 RBI, 31 SB

Span had a very good 2009 and a disappointing 2010. His average dropped from .311 to .264 and his OBP from .392 to 331. As is usually the case, he should come back toward the middle. The team’s supposed new emphasis on speed, and his batting in front of Nishioka, could also get him 30 SB for the first time.

2. Tsuyoshi Nichioka, 2B, .275 AVG, 5 HR, 50 RBI, 25 SB

Considering the Twins aren’t readily naming him the starting shortstop, I get the sense they aren’t overly impressed by is collection of gold gloves in Japan. The league over there also has much smaller parks, so don’t expect him to approach even his career highs of 14 homer runs and 59 RBIs. Also, he was a career .280 hitter before jumping to .346 last year, so expect something closer to that. On the plus side, he’ll give the team more speed and he’s a switch hitter that can bat second.

3. Joe Mauer, C, .335 AVG, .410 OBP, 40 2B, 14 HR, 85 RBI

Like Span, expect Mr. Minnesota to fall somewhere between his amazing 2009 and his (yawn) .327 average, 43 doubles, .402 OBP 2010. With his swing and the deep gaps at the new park, Mauer may never hit 28 home runs again. I’d bet against it. But he will continue to hit a lot more doubles. 

4. Justin Morneau, 1B, .270 AVG, 24 HR, 90 RBI

Morneau was on his way to a career year last year, hitting .345 with 18 HR in 81 games before going down with a concussion. I think it’s probably unrealistic to think that he won’t miss a beat after not playing competitively for 8 months. Expect solid, if unspectacular numbers from him early on. 

5. Delmon Young, LF, .288 AVG, 35 2B, 18 HR, 100 RBI

It will be interesting to see how Delmon comes back after his career year in 2010. He started last year in much better shape, and with an unrecognizable hitting approach, that resulted in a .298 average, 112 RBI, 46 doubles, a few more walks and fewer strikeouts. Will be be motivated to keep himself in good shape and do it again (especially considering he’s playing for a new contract) or will be revert back to his old form?

My guess is that he had a lot of fun last year, remembering what it was like to hit tape measure blasts in batting practice, and then carrying that into the game. He’s no longer content to flip the ball to right field, and he’s clearly got a better understanding of when (at what counts and in what part of the game) to swing for the fences and when to put the ball in play.

6. Jason Kubel, DH, .265 AVG, 22 HR, 82 RBI/

Jim Thome DH, .270 AVG, 16 HR, 40 RBI

My gut tell me Jason Kubel’s days with the Twins may be numbered. He’s pretty much already expendable in ’11 if Cuddyer, Morneau and Thome stay healthy, and after this year his contract is up. With the Twins’ desire to get faster as a team and better defensively, and several younger, cheaper prospects coming up, it seems unlikely that both Kubel and Cuddyer will be on the team after this season. 

Morneau’s injury, and Cuddyer’s move to first, allowed Kubel to get a full season of at bats last year. He continued to struggle against left-handers, and finished with 21 HR, 92 RBI and a .249 average. He should once again provide some power in the lower part of the order, but a lot of at bats against lefties will once again keep him from posting a high average.

As for Thome, a healthy Morneau means he’ll get the playing time he was expecting to get last season (Morneau every day at first, Cuddyer every day in RF, and Thome, Kubel and the occasional righty Repko against lefties at DH). Instead of 25 HR in 276 at bats, expect 16 HR in 215 at bats.

7. Michael Cuddyer, RF, .275, 30 2B, 18 HR, 90 RBI

I’m expecting a bit of a bounce-back year for Cuddyer, who suffered more than anyone in his first year playing at Target Field. I don’t know if I believe Gardy’s theory that settling in at a position allows guys to focus on their hitting, but I hope he’s right. The Twins can’t afford to pay 11 million dollars for a .270s singles hitter, with no speed, who leads the league in ground ball double plays.

8. Danny Valencia, 3B, .280, 17 HR, 70 RBI

I really think the Twins have finally found their long-term answer at third base. Valencia probably won’t sustain the .311 clip he hit at for half a season to start his career, but if he even close to that, the team is set at third. His ability to work counts into his favor, draw walks and hit back through the middle, along with his late-season power surge, give me some confidence that he’s more than a half-season wonder.

9. Alexi Casilla, SS, .260 AVG, 4 HR, 40 RBI, 15 SB

Hopefully the third time is the charm for Casilla, who has already tanked twice after twice being in position to win a starting job in spring training. Still just 26, the Twins are hoping Casilla can regain his 2008 form where he hit .281 with 7 HR and 50 RBI in 98 games.

Check back in the coming weeks when I’ll preview the Twins bench, pitching staff and bullpen.

Things may not have gone as well as the Farmington swimming and diving team had hoped at this weekend’s Class 2A True Team State Meet – the Tigers finished 12th out of 12 teams – but that didn’t stop one Farmington athlete from standing out. 

Senior Tyler Magalis, an annual visitor to the University of Minnesota Aquatics Center for the Class 2A State Meet – set a state record with his 11-dive score of 447.80. I’m not really even sure what specifically that score means (other than that he’s way better at diving than almost every prep in the state), but I know from watching Magalis compete up close at Thursday’s meet against Rochester Mayo at Dodge Middle School that what he can do is impressive.

There are times when you’re watching your 200th high school sporting event of the year that you catch yourself thinking “Heck, I could have made that shot” or “That’s not all that impressive.” Needless to say, there were no thoughts like that in my head when I was watching Magalis jump off the diving board and flip around in the air two or three times before breaking the surface of the water with hardly a splash. I didn’t need to know a bit about diving to know that what he did was pretty amazing and could be done by a very, very small percentage of the population. 

So, Kudos to Mr. Magalis and good luck to him and the rest of the Tiger swimmers who will qualify for state later this month. Here are some submitted photos from True Team State…

Looking back at some older blog posts recently, I noticed my list of the top five Farmington individual performers of the fall sports season. With all the success the Tiger teams have had this winter, I don’t know if a top 5 or even a top 10 is going to be possible. Consider…

-The girls hockey team is going to likely win its second straight Missota Conference title, thanks in large part to a talented roster that includes Krystal Baumann, Hannah Alexander and goalie Jessica Erchul. 

-The boys hockey team is hovering around .500, but is the best squad they’ve put together since I’ve been here. Certainly team scoring leader Tyler Grubb would have to be featured on any list of the winter’s top performers.

-The girls basketball team has just one loss and has already appeared in the Class 4A State rankings. The team is balanced, but 5-11 guard Taylor Meyer and 6-2 post Jordan Bridges manage to stand out.

-The gymnastics team is also having a historic season, having already set a school team scoring record at 142.7 points. Their talented roster includes vault record-setter Nadia Lorencz, returning state qualifier and school bars record holder Terra Klima, and all-around leader Kiana Lord. State qualifications could determine which gymnasts earn a spot on my all-winter team.

-Carl Elmer just became the 11th Farmington wrestler to reach 100 career victories. He’ll likely make another state appearance this March.

-Several members of the swimming and diving team  figure to make return trips to state, including all-state diver Tyler Magalis, and swimmers Brian Huls, Loren Hatten and Zach Holton.

-Alex Michels is having an outstanding season while leading the Farmington boys basketball team.

It will be interesting to see how the second half of the winter sports seasons play out, and see which individuals earn a spot on my list of the top five individual performers.

Last night’s Madden ’11, Packers at Bears…

Packers 27, Bears 24

Aaron Rodgers – 20-29, 240 yards, 2 TD

Jay Cutler- 15-27, 220 yards, 2 TD, 2 INT

CHICAGO (AP) – Aaron Rodgers’ 11-yard touchdown pass to Donald Lee with 12 seconds left capped off a 66-yard drive in the final two minutes and sent the Packers to their first super bowl in 14 years with a 27-24 victory Sunday at Soldier Field.

The Packers (13-6) led 20-10 at halftime before the Bears rallied. Jay Cutler threw a couple long touchdowns to Johnny Knox and Devin Hester, giving Chicago its first lead late in the fourth quarter.

At the beginning of the winter season I sent out questionnaires to the senior members of the Farmington sports teams. I didn’t realize there were so many more seniors than there are editions of our weekly paper, so I thought I’d use the blog to bring you some of my favorite survey answers…

Sebren Baer’s favorite quote:

“Sebren, you are not allowed to get hurt.” -Coach Shane Wyandt

Sarah Silber’s (and several other girls basketball players’) greatest high school sports memory:

Coach Berg dancing during last year’s section tournament.

Swimmer Drew Cayard on his superstitions:

If a black cat walks by me in the pool area I will have a bad season. I don’t think that will end up happening, though.

Alex Michels is the superstitious type, as well…

If I clip my fingernails the day of or before a game, I consider it bad luck. Also, I must have an Aunt Jemima bacon and scrambled eggs microwave meal before every game in order to perform at my best. Oh, and the eggs must have pepper on them and the bacon needs to be microwaved an extra 15 seconds for extra crispiness.

Matt Stephan’s answer was the crown jewel of all the answers I received on superstitions:

I tend to try to flick my underwear up with my foot and try to catch them in my hand and if I succeed in this, then I know it’s going to be a good meet

Jessica Gaalswyk, on her favorite Farmington athlete:

Jessica crossed out her sister Jenna’s name, and instead went with Hannah Alexander. Alexander, by the way, has been by far the most popular answer for this question.

Jessica’s favorite high school sports memory?

When Desi Loftus gave me a black eye in 11th grade.

Many Farmington athletes went through day-long routines when asked how they get ready for a game. Dan Handberg said…

I truly start getting ready for a game during the national anthem.

Best secret talent goes to Sam Hanson:

I am really good at Sudoku.

Upon further review, Sam has to share that title with Emily Severson:

I don’t really have any secret talents. The fact that I know every song in the movie Pocahontas was revealed during Homecoming week. I don’t know if you’d call memorization a talent, though.

But props to Tyler Grubb for admitting…

I am actually somewhat of an artsy guy.

I know some of you were looking forward, as I was, to watching Saturday night’s NFC divisional playoff game between the Packers and the Falcons. It figured to be a high-scoring game between two hot teams, so it would have been an entertaining way to spend part of your weekend.

However, I’ve decided to save you all 3 1/2 hours of your life that you can use to go to a museum or spend time with your families. The Packers are going to win 23-21.

How could I know this, you ask? Did I rig up a flux capacitor to my Honda Civic? Did Conan tell me during an In the Year 3000 sketch? Was I fooled by that new Onion sports show?

Nope, I played the game out on Madden ’11. With all the players and settings arranged just as they will be on Saturday night, I played out the Packers vs. Falcons game. Here’s what happened…

Another late pick sends Packers to NFC title game

ATLANTA (AP) – Just when it looked like Matt Ryan was going to play the hero, Charles Woodson silenced the Georgia Dome crowd with an interception – the first turnover of the game by either team – to send the Packers to the NFC title game for the first time since 2007-08 with a 23-21 victory over the top-seeded Falcons.

The Falcons (13-4) led 14-13 at the half, but found themselves facing a nine-point deficit with six minutes to go after Aaron Rodgers hooked up with John Kuhn for a 7-yard touchdown pass that made it 23-14 Packers.

Ryan responded by guiding Atlanta 60 yards in five plays, leading to a five-yard touchdown pass on third and goal with 4:17 remaining.

The Packers ran the ball four straight times on their next possession, and the Falcons used their timeouts to preserve 1 minute, 56 seconds of clock for their offense. Ryan completed a couple of passes to move the ball to the Atlanta 40, but his final heave of the day was picked off by Woodson at the 20-yard line.

The Packers (12-6) produced enough offense to win despite struggling in the red zone for much of the game. A one-yard play-action touchdown pass from Rodgers to Kuhn made it 10-7 Packers midway through the second, but the offense stalled on three other drives that led to field goals of 47, 36 and 39 yards by Mason Crosby. The 39-yarder made it 16-14 Packers with 3:36 left in the third.

Atlanta scored on its opening drive. Michael Turner moved the ball down the field with a series of good runs before Ryan hooked up with Roddy White for a seven-yard touchdown.

Turner broke loose for a 40-yard touchdown with 1:20 remaining before halftime to give the Falcons their final lead at 14-13.

Final stats

Green Bay

Rodgers - 16 of 28, 233 yards, 2 TD, 0 INT, 5-25 rush

Starks – 16-64 rush

Atlanta

Ryan – 12 of 24, 186 yards, TD, INT

Turner – 17-125 rush

Just in case this isn’t exactly what happens, you might want to tune in. Go Packers!

Farmington’s girls basketball team has had an exciting week.

*On Tuesday, the Tigers used their smothering defense to hold Faribault to a season-low 25 points in a victory that improved their record to a school-record 9-0

*On Wednesday, the Tigers debuted at No. 9 in the Class 4A rankings.

*On Thursday, the Tigers passed their biggest test of the season when they held on for a 61-57 win over third-ranked (Class 3A) Red Wing at Tiger Gym. They won despite committing 22 turnovers and shooting 33 percent from the field.

After watching the Tigers play Thursday night, I have to say they appear to have a lot going for them. They’re 10-0 and all of their final 15 games fall into the “winnable” category. The biggest challenges will likely be a couple of games against ninth-ranked (Class 3A) New Prague, a February rematch at Red Wing and a couple games against 8-1 Shakopee.

Tiger Strengths:

*They play 9-10 players deep, which came in handy in Thursday night’s back-and-forth barn burner against Red Wing.

*They have athletic guards who can handle the ball and break the press (Paige Steele, Shelby Calhoun, Isis Alexander).

*They have tall, athletic post players who can rebound (Elena Koch and Jordan Bridges).

*They have a go-to scorer to rely on in big games (Taylor Meyer). 

*They have lots of varsity experience among their regulars (seven seniors).

*They have an enthusiastic, veteran coach in Jason Berg. 

Head coach Jason Berg brings enthusiasm to the FHS sideline.