Fastpitch in Marshall! Success! (VIDEO!)

We have a very close game playing out in Marshall against BOLD. I'll post the final score when it's over.

Final: B-B-E 3, BOLD 2! The Jaguars stay alive and now play the number one seed from the north half, Lac qui Parle Valley, at 3 p.m.

To win the game, Anna Jaeger fielded a deep hit to center field and made a perfect throw to her cutoff, Kacey Fischer at shortstop. She then made a perfect throw to catcher Brooklyn Fischer, who tagged out the game-winning run at home plate. It was incredible!

**Here's the postgame celebration immediately following the call made at home plate against BOLD:


Here's a video from the bottom of the second inning against BOLD:


The Warriors left two stranded in the second inning, which preserved B-B-E's 1-0 lead.

**Game two update: the Jaguars scored one run in the top of the fifth inning to take a 5-2 lead. Earlier, they scored four runs in the top of the fourth inning to erase a 2-0 deficit.

**Game two update: the LQPV Eagles have a 6-5 lead in the sixth inning.

Final score: LQPV 10, B-B-E 5. The Jaguars finish a terrific season with a 10-13 overall record. This is their best record since the 2009 season, when they finished 11-9 overall and went 1-1 in the playoffs.

For LQPV, the Eagles improve to 18-6 overall as they are gunning to return to the Section 3A finals for the first time since 2022. This year, LQPV finished 13-1 in the Camden Conference to tie for the title with Minneota/Canby. In 2022, the Eagles lost in the championship series to Edgerton/Southwest MN Christian. In a winner-take-all game, Edgerton/SW MN Christian won 3-0 to advance to state. Earlier today, LQPV lost 4-0 to Russel-Tyler-Ruthton in a winner's bracket game.

Also today, Wabasso ended Renville County West's season with a 7-2 elimination bracket win. Heading into the Section 3A Final Four are R-T-R, Wabasso, LQPV and Edgerton/SW MN Christian.

Time to head home.

B-B-E Class of 2024 graduation (LIVE VIDEO)

The B-B-E Class of 2024 graduation is tonight, in less than two hours. The ceremony begins at 7:30 p.m. at the high school's gymnasium. In case you didn't read it yet in the newspaper, the May 23 issue of the Bonanza Valley Voice features a center spread with all 39 graduates included. It mentions that the live video player for graduation can be found at the newspaper website. To see that, you can click here: https://t.ly/n9lGt.

I'm still combing through my fastpitch video from yesterday's games. I've got a few uploaded and posted. Here's another video from that exciting day of playoff action. This is during the Renville County West game. Our B-B-E Jaguars fastpitch team stays alive in the Section 3A tournament and faces BOLD tomorrow in Marshall at 1 p.m.

Action in the top of the sixth inning vs. RCW:


The Jaguar defense turned a slick 6-4-3 double play for the first two outs of the top of the sixth. Shortstop Kacey Fischer scooped up a grounder and tossed it to Kenna Lieser at second base. Lieser then rifled a put-out throw to first base to get the batter.

You can catch an additional video from Thursday's playoff action by clicking over to the Bonanza Valley Voice newspaper at this link: https://t.ly/TrXB-. There, you can watch action from the bottom of the sixth inning against Ortonville. The Jaguars scored four runs and left one stranded with two hits, including a two-RBI single to left field by Brooklyn Fischer.

Time to get ready for graduation!

...later Friday night...after graduation...I've had time to settle in and relax, and now I have time to complain about the mistake in the Section 3A fastpitch playoff bracket at the MSHSL website. I wasted almost an hour of my time scouting Yellow Medicine East's team...now I need to spend additional time scouting BOLD. I will save the YME statistics, as it is possible our Jaguars will meet YME further into the bracket if they stay alive in the elimination bracket. The BOLD Warriors are 13-8 overall after going 1-1 in yesterday's Sub-Section 3A-South games played in Edgerton. In the regular season, the Warriors went 8-6 in the West Central Conference for fourth place alone. BOLD's main pitcher is eighth grader Kaitlyn Flann. Her father, Derek Flann, is the BOLD athletic department's director and also the head coach of the Warriors football team.

Round two fastpitch loss, Jaguars move into elimination bracket *UPDATED / VIDEO

A tense, well-played playoff game with a huge crowd had an outcome hanging in the balance until the seventh inning tonight for the second round of the Sub-Section 3A-North playoffs. With the lead changing hands three times, the Renville County West Jaguars came from behind to win 7-4 against our B-B-E Jaguars fastpitch team as they improved to 9-11 on the season.

B-B-E led 4-3 going into the top of the seventh inning. They left one stranded in the bottom of the seventh while being stymied by two ground ball plays and a pop fly to end the game. Earlier, our Jaguars broke a 3-3 tie in the bottom of the fifth inning on Faith Radermacher's one out sacrifice fly-RBI that scored Anna Jaeger. In the bottom of the second, our Jaguars erased a 2-0 deficit with a run scored by Kacey Fischer on an error and then RBI singles from Ava Lieser and Jaeger.

Freshman Mya Worms fired a three-hitter in the playoff opener, as our Jaguars defeated Ortonville 7-2 earlier today. Worms fired eight strikeouts against the Trojans. For B-B-E, they had just three strikeouts of their own through both games. Also huge: our Jaguars had just one error in each game.

Our Jaguars, now 9-12 overall, advance in the playoffs in the elimination bracket of the Section 3A tournament. They play in a win-or-go-home contest on Saturday, May 25 at 1 p.m. at the Marshall fastpitch softball complex. The opponent is to be determined, although I believe it will be Yellow Medicine East. RCW advances to play the 3A-South's top seed, Edgerton/Southwest MN Christian.

RCW is having their best playoff run since the 2015 season, when they went 2-2 in the Section 3A tournament before getting knocked out by neighboring rival BOLD.

More to come later. I need to get my second crop of potatoes planted before I run out of daylight!

Here's action from the Ortonville game in the bottom of the second inning:


In that second inning, the Jaguars left the bases stranded as the game was scoreless through the first four innings.

UPDATE: the MSHSL bracket says that our Jaguars will play Yellow Medicine East in the next playoff game at 1 p.m. on Saturday in Marshall. It's a win-or-go-home contest, and the winner stays alive to play right away at 3 p.m. in Marshall on Saturday. The stakes are high, but I am excited about Saturday and have high expectations for good things to come our way!

YME (8-12 overall) is the No. 5 seed in Sub-Section 3A-North. They went 1-1 today at Lac qui Parle Valley high school with a 7-0 win over Benson in the opener before an 11-2 loss to top-seeded LQPV. The Jaguars can have payback in their mind, as their season ended at the hands of the Sting in a 7-0 loss to YME during last year's playoff opener. Also, in the 2022 playoff opener at Murdock, YME defeated the Jaguars 2-1 to end our season. Time to return the favor!

A few random notes on YME...on May 14 in a Camden Conference doubleheader, YME split with RCW with a 2-1 loss and then a 13-2 win.

**Friday update...on Saturday, the Jaguars will play BOLD in an elimination game at 1 p.m. in Marshall. The MSHSL made a mistake when filling out the bracket last night. I'll let it go. I am too busy to be upset by that.

In baseball news...
At Upsala tonight, the B-B-E Jaguars baseball team earned what I'll call a "section split" with a 1-1 showing. They began with a crucial 6-0 win against Upsala/Swanville Area. Next was Long Prairie-Grey Eagle, who is currently the No. 2-ranked team in Sub-Section 6A-North. The Thunder led 6-0 through five innings, and the Jaguars scored three runs to go into the seventh inning trailing 6-3. LP-GE then tacked on two runs in the top of the seventh before shutting the door in an 8-3 win. Our Jaguars finish the regular season with a 13-7 overall record. This is their best regular season record since 2016! Seeding for the playoffs takes place on Saturday.

LP-GE (11-4 overall) finished as champions in the Prairie Conference this season with a 5-1 record, and they've won five straight to close out their regular seaosn. In second place was U/SA with a 4-2 record.

In track and field news...
Junior Taylor Nelson placed fifth in the Sub-Section 5A-West track and field championships held today at Maple Lake. He finished with a time of 11:03.15. That's the best finish I saw after glancing through the meet results. In the 1600 run, Nelson also placed fifth and had a time of 5:00.67. I also saw that sophomore Kameron Hiltner had a fifth-place showing; he took fifth in the 100 open with a time of 12.18 seconds (he's fast!).

In boys' golf news...
At the Section 5A meet in Willmar on Wednesday, B-B-E's Walker Winter finished in the top eight of the individual standings to advance into the Section Finals round. There's additional boys' golf coverage in this week's Bonanza Valley Voice newspaper.

Section 3A first round fastpitch playoff scores on May 23:
Lac qui Parle Valley 7, MACCRAY 1
Yellow Medicine East 7, Benson 0
Wabasso 7, Tracy-Milroy-Balaton 5
Russel-Tyler-Ruthton 10, Adrian/Ellsworth 0
BOLD 5, Murray County Central 4
Edgerton/SW MN Christian 14, Lakeview 1 (5 innings)

1-and-Oh! Let's GO! (VIDEOS, Updates)

A 1-0 start is what's in the book for the No. 2-seeded B-B-E Jaguars fastpitch team, after they dispatched No. 7-seeded Ortonville 7-2 in the Sub-Section 3A-North opener. The Trojans end the season 5-15 overall, while the Jaguars advance in the Section 3A tournament bracket with a 9-11 record. This is B-B-E's first playoff win since 2021, when they won 17-10 in a play-in round game against Ortonville before falling 7-6 to top-seeded Benson (who made it all the way to the Section 6A finals that year).

Game two in Brooten today features No. 3-seeded Renville County West and No. 6-seeded Dawson-Boyd.

Against the Trojans, the Jaguars battled through four scoreless innings before they broke through in the bottom of the fifth. Anna Jaeger, batting at the top of the order for the Jaguars, took a pitch on her upper leg to get on base, and the veteran senior advanced to second on a passed ball. Kenna Lieser then hit an RBI-single to score Jaeger from third base to break up the scoreless tie. The Jaguars ultimately scored three total runs to go up 3-0 going into the sixth.

In the sixth, Brooklyn Fischer's two-RBI single to left field made it a 5-0 lead. Two more runs were scored when Kacey Fischer hit a ground ball to the second baseman, but the throw to first was bobbled to bring in Faith Radermacher and Brooklyn Fischer to make it 7-0.

The Trojans got two back in the top of the seventh before shortstop Kacey Fischer made a tremendous throw to first base to end the game.

An 11-hit attack helped fuel the late outburst of offense for the Jaguars, who had freshman Mya Worms pitch a complete game for her first career playoff win.

**Here's Coach Funk in a post-game interview today:


B-B-E's 9-11 record is the best since the 2009 season, when the Jaguars went 1-1 in the Sub-Section 5A-West playoffs. This year, the playoffs will continue on after Round 2 regardless of the outcome of tonight's game, as the Sub-Section 3A-North tournament features a double elimination format once a team wins the playoff opener. More on that will be posted later tonight. For now, we need to focus on getting another playoff win tonight!!! Let's go!!!!!!!!

Here's a video featuring the final out recorded against Ortonville today:


Today's B-B-E games are being broadcast on Smooth Magic 107 FM of Glenwood. Brady will be covering the third game of today, which will feature our Jaguars! They take on the winner of game two, which is starting at about 4:50 p.m. Stay tuned here for updates on when the last game will get underway.

Update out of Upsala tonight...in a huge game with seeding implications, the B-B-E Jaguars baseball team defeated Upsala/Swanville Area 6-0 to improve to 13-6 on the season. They later trailed Long Prairie-Grey Eagle 6-0 in the fifth inning in the second game of the doubleheader.

**Update: RCW won 13-4 while ending the Blackjacks' season.  Game three of the day started just shy of 7:00 p.m. between both Jaguar teams. 

After 3 innings, the game is tied 3-3! More to come in a new blog post, including baseball updates.

The aftermath

I survived the 20-page newspaper. The mighty struggle that lasted roughly four days to assemble it concluded with me beating my deadline! It was a huge victory for the Bonanza Valley Voice newspaper. I printed many extras too, so please go out and get a copy of you are not a subscriber. They are at RJ's Mini Mart in Brooten and also Coop's Corner and the Belgrade Hardware Store. On Thursday, I hope to get copies to Bayer Gas and Grocery in Elrosa.

Here's what lies ahead for next week's newspaper: a long, long list of "held over" news and sports items will eat up considerable space in the May 30 issue. I'll get to writing about that later.

Here's a video from Wednesday morning at the elementary school:


That was fun! It is always an inspiring experience to see the seniors interact with elementary students in such a positive, memorable fashion. Bravo!!! This crazy, stupid world needs more of this.

Thursday update...major news: the Class of 2024 graduation ceremony has been moved indoors due the potential for severe weather on Friday night. The ceremony will be held in the high school gymnasium at 7:30 p.m. Please spread the word!!

Area fastpitch playoff scores on May 22:
St. Cloud Cathedral 12, Paynesville Area 0 (the Crusaders are the No. 1 seed in Section 6AA)
Albany 10, Eden Valley-Watkins 0
Paynesville Area 4, Eden Valley-Watkins 1 (a Section 6AA elimination game; the Eagles finish 15-6 overall, while the Bulldogs improve to 12-11)
PACT Charter 13, Atwater-Cosmos-Grove City 2 (5 innings; this loss sends A-C-GC to the elimination bracket of Section 4A)
Kimball Area 11, Pequot Lakes 1

Sports schedule changes: fastpitch moved to THURSDAY! (VIDEO)

Quite a bit to catch up on, but all I have time to post right now is the following.

Due to the rain in the forecast for tomorrow, the B-B-E Jaguars fastpitch team will open the Sub-Section 3A-North playoffs on Thursday this week, NOT Wednesday. This is due to other schools having academic and activity-related conflicts on Wednesday. The Jaguars will host three games on Wednesday at the home diamond in Brooten. First is a game between the Jaguars and No. 7-seeded Ortonville (5-14) with a 3 p.m. start time. Then the next two games will follow as outlined last week in the schedule.

The baseball team will also not play tomorrow, and their game against Long Prairie-Grey Eagle will be played on Thursday in Upsala as part of what is now a doubleheader. More details to follow.

Tuesday afternoon update: the home fastpitch diamond has covers across home plate and the pitcher's circle. The infield has a ton of water on it due to sometimes heavy rainfall coming down. It's wet out there!!!

Another announcement: the sub-section track and field meet set in Maple Lake for today has been postponed until Thursday this week.

Here's a video from the last fastpitch game of the regular season, which was last Thursday:


More to come later tonight. The 20-page newspaper is coming along!!

Snakebitten: Grovers defeat Elrosa Saints by one run

Four games into the season, the Elrosa Saints amateur baseball team is far better than their record suggests. Unfortunately, they will head into Memorial Day weekend still searching for their first win of the season after they were defeated 7-6 at Meire Grove today.

The loss comes on the heels of a 12-7 setback to visiting Lake Henry for the home opener held yesterday.

Today is about a 20-hour work day for me. Sunburg hosted an outstanding Syttende Mai celebration! Believe it or not, tonight I had to set up a 20-page Bonanza Valley Voice layout for the May 23 issue. At this point, I do not know if I can pull it off. In all likelihood, it will be 18 pages. If it is 18 pages, it will be the biggest newspaper I've published since prior to the pandemic.

Hot off the press!
Everyone is invited to a Grand Opening celebration for the new Jenniges Meat Processing plant and retail store from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. on Friday, May 31. Come celebrate the opening with the Jenniges family! The event features FREE brats, burgers and hot dogs served with chips, Local Pantry salad and beans. Guests can tour and walk through the new facility. This is an exciting event for our community. Be sure to stop by! Their company website is: https://jennigesmeatprocessing.com.

Another series sweep; Illies homers in 7th (VIDEO)

The B-B-E Jaguars baseball team defeated visiting Maple Lake 13-4 tonight in the final game of the Central Minnesota Conference schedule. It was technically a makeup game of game two of the April 18 doubleheader. They nixed game two that day due to the cold. I'll never forget going back to the minivan after game one ended and seeing 41 degrees on the thermometer that night. Brrr!! Today the temperature shot well past 80 degrees.

The Jaguars (12-6) finished 9-5 in the CMC, which gave them fourth place alone. Two games remain on the regular season schedule.

Here's action from the top of the seventh inning tonight:


In the top of the seventh, Luke Illies hit a two-RBI home run over the 360-foot fenceline in right field. The Jaguars scored 3 runs in the seventh inning after scoring 5 runs in the top of the sixth to blow the game open.

Ethan Mueller pitched a gem of a game with six hits, one earned run, no walks and eight strikeouts in a complete-game effort. At the plate, the junior was walked four times and scored two runs. The Jaguars out-hit the Irish 10 to 6, and both teams had two errors. Luke Dingmann led the offense by going 3-for-5 with two doubles, two RBI, two runs scored and two stolen bases.

Next: a home game next Tuesday against Long Prairie-Grey Eagle (9-4) in a non-conference section game. The Thunder finished as sole champions of the Prairie Conference with a 5-1 record. Upsala/Swanville Area (12-6) finished in second place with a 4-2 record.

I am adding a few more notes to the most recent blog post, which highlights the fastpitch softball playoffs.

In college baseball news...
Congratulations to the St. Cloud Technical and Community College Cyclones baseball team, who has now won 11 straight games after claiming the NJCAA Region 13 championship with a 15-8 win over Century College earlier today. The lineup for the Cyclones includes B-B-E's Blaine Fischer and Will VanBeck.

I'll get more promotion of this in future blog post and newspaper issues, but I want to at least get the date thrown out there for an exciting event coming to Saints Field in Elrosa in June. On June 19, the Elrosa Saints baseball program will be hosting a youth baseball clinic. Mark your calendars!

Area baseball scores on May 18:
New London-Spicer 5, Glencoe-Silver Lake 0
NL-S 13, G-SL 1
Border West 14, Barnesville 4
Upsala/Swanville Area 4, Royalton 3
New York Mills 8, Wadena-Deer Creek 1
MACCRAY 4, Russel-Tyler-Ruthton 2
Morris Area/Chokio-Alberta 12, Lac qui Parle Valley 2
Parkers Prairie 3, Menagha 2 (9 innings)
Kimball Area 8, Annandale 4
Brandon-Evansville 13, West Central Area 3 (6 innings)

Breaking! Terrific news! Fastpitch Jaguars seeded No. 2 for playoffs (VIDEO)

It is official! (*UPDATED Friday night to correct a big mistake)

The B-B-E Jaguars fastpitch team has earned the No. 2 seed for the Sub-Section 3A-North playoffs. This is their best playoff ranking in over 23 years! Back in 2008, the Jaguars were seeded No. 3 in Sub-Section 5A-West. In both 2006 and 2009, they were the No. 4 seed. During the 2008 playoffs, the Jaguars had a 3-0 start to claim the school's only fastpitch subsection title. They earned a small upset in the sub-section finals by defeating No. 2-seeded Osakis. Then came the tall task: No. 1-seeded and No. 3-ranked Maple Lake in the finals. A 6-5 win over the Irish was the result, which handed the team the program's only sub-section title in a game I will never, ever forget at Minnewaska Area's softball complex. In fact, if you want to see my recap of that game played back on May 22, 2008, you can click here: https://bbejaguars.blogspot.com/2008/05/jaguars-fastpitch-vanquishes-state.html.

We will have to go back to at least 2000 before I'll be able to find a sub-section seeding list that has the Jaguars ranked No. 2. In the 2000 season, our top pitcher's mom, Amy Worms, was a sophomore in high school. In that season, the Jaguars took third place in the Section 5A tournament. I will look up what they were seeded that year.

This year, the Jaguars are ranked second out of eight teams in Sub-Section 3A-North. They host a four-team subsection pod with three games coming in Brooten on Tuesday, May 21. The Jaguars (8-11) have a 3 p.m. game that day against No. 7-seeded Ortonville. A total of three games will be played. The second game features No. 3-seeded Renville County West facing No. 6-seeded Dawson-Boyd, and that will start at 4:30 or later, depending on how long the B-B-E vs. Ortonville game lasts. The third game features the winners of both games, and that will start at 6 p.m. or later - again, depending on how long the first two games last. The losers in the first two games are done for the season. The winners of those first two games earn a pass to the third round of the Section 3A tournament, which will be held on Saturday, May 25 at the Marshall Area high school fastpitch facilities. The Saturday, May 25 schedule is complex - too complex for me to decipher now. Honestly, that day does not matter at this point, as the Jaguars have to focus on earning a win in the playoff opener next Tuesday against the Trojans!

More to come after I review all of the Section 3A bracket. We do need the forecast to change. As of now, it looks "grim" for Tuesday with a 72 percent change of rain and predicted rainfall totals of about one inch.

2024 Sub-Section 3A-North fastpitch seedings:
1. Lac qui Parle Valley (15-5)
2. B-B-E (8-11)
3. Renville County West (7-11)
4. Benson (6-13)
5. Yellow Medicine East (7-12)
6. Dawson-Boyd (5-11)
7. Ortonville (5-14)
8. MACCRAY (1-17)

Defending Section 3A champion and Class 1A state champion Edgerton/Southwest MN Christian (14-4) is the top seed in Sub-Section 3A-South. The No. 2 seed is Russel-Tyler-Ruthton (16-3). Those two teams each went 10-1 in the Red Rock Conference to share the title. Edgerton/SW MN Christian also won state titles in 2016 and 2019. They were state runners-up in 2017 and 2018 to New York Mills (both years). The Eagles have won the Section 3A championship every year since 2014. In 2013, Kerkhoven-Murdock-Sunburg swept through the Section 3A tournament, including two playoff wins vs. the Eagles, on their way to a fourth-place finish at state. K-M-S took fifth place at state in 2012 after also claiming the Section 3A title.

Here's a video from the pregame huddle before the top of the first inning yesterday against Upsala:


Backing up to Central Minnesota Conference fastpitch news...yesterday, the Holdingford Huskers lost 11-10 to visiting Royalton, which forced a three-way tie for fourth place between our Jaguars, the Huskers and the Royals. All three teams finished 6-8 in the CMC. The top three in the conference featured Kimball Area (champions), Eden Valley-Watkins (second place) and Paynesville Area (third place).

In Section 6AA, Kimball Area (19-1) got the No. 2 seed behind St. Cloud Cathedral. Eden Valley-Watkins (14-4) was seeded No. 5, Paynesville Area (10-10) was seeded No. 9, Royalton (7-12) was seeded No. 11 and Holdingford (7-12) was seeded No. 12.