Sports

Don Martindale wins first-ever State Championship as head coach, assisted by Annie (Stelow) Kalous

by Perry Hesse

Estherville-Lincoln Central (ELC) head girls basketball coach Don Martindale triumphantly put his right fist in the air as junior forward Brei Christoffer hugged the ball tightly while time ran out awarding Martindale and his Class 3A Midgets the State Championship title at Wells Fargo Arena in Des Moines March 12. For Martindale, it highlighted an already highly successful coaching career that has spanned over 40 years with his love for the game beginning as a prep in Waukon. ELC defeated Ballard, 44-30, as the Bombers attempted to repeat as State Champions after winning the Class 4A title last year.

The 2022 NCAA Men’s Basketball Tournament is headed toward its final week of competition, meaning a new champion will be crowned in the tournament and in The Standard’s Bracket Challenge within the next week. Following this past weekend’s trimming of the tournament field to its final four teams, the top 22 Challenge entries currently stand as follows:

Annabelle Dibert    85
Kristi Campbell    80
John Reinke    79
Chase Adam    79
Morgan Weymiller    77
Keira McCormick    75
Caity Schultz    74
Charlene Baxter    73
Pat Stilwell    71
Jerry Brinkman    71
Stan Johnson    71
Scott Dougherty    70
Grady Goetzinger    69
Mitchell Schultz    68
Tate Ellingson    67
Kent Schultz    67
Kaley Benzing    66
Diane Piittmann    66
Caylie Adam    65
Gina Curtin    65
Tucker Jackson    65
Mark Welsh    65

The Waukon boys track team got its 2022 season underway as a full team, competing in the Northeast Iowa Conference (NEIC) Indoor Meet hosted by Luther College in Decorah Tuesday, March 22. No team scores were kept in the meet, but the Indians made their presence felt with finishes within the top two placewinnings of six different events, including three event wins.

Senior Braxton Stewart recorded two of those three gold medal performances, winning the high jump with a leap of 6’2” and topping the 400 meter dash field with a clocking of 53.75 seconds. The track Tribe’s other event victory came in the 4x800 relay in a time of 8:47.17 recorded by the crew of senior Logan Delaney and juniors Josh Keenan, Nate Keenan and Nathan O’Neill.

The 2022 Waukon boys track team will field one of its largest fields in recent memory, as 71 young men have reported for early-season duty this spring. That largest in recent memory number, however, will only be headlined by nine returning varsity letterwinners from last season, but within those returning veterans lies some considerable accomplishment at the highest level of Iowa high school track and field competition.

“That is the most I can remember being out in the last 25 years,” Waukon boys track coach Ted Snitker said of this season’s sizable group of competitors.

The 2022 Waukon girls track team has had 27 young ladies report for early-season duty and will certainly benefit from the fact that 18 of them return with varsity letterwinning experience from previous seasons. Even more beneficial than that is the fact that nearly half of those veteran returnees will bring back experience from last season’s State Meet that covers a wide array of events.

“We bring back eight girls who competed at the State Meet last year,” Waukon girls track coach Bob Wasson said. “I will look for them to use that experience to help motivate themselves and their teammates to work hard so that they can hopefully get to participate at State this year.”

The 2022 Kee girls track team will benefit from the return of eight letterwinners, half of which bring back experience from every high school track and field athlete’s ultimate destination, the State Track Meet. Those eight veterans will make up a majority of this season’s squad of 13 total competitors for Coach Chad Winters.

Those returning veterans are headlined by a lone senior in Haley Meyer, who is one of the most decorated runners in Kee High School history as a four-time All-State cross country runner and Class 1A State Champion, as well as nearly doubling that State medal count in track and field. “Haley Meyer returns for her senior season as a seven-time State medalist, including two relay championships,” Coach Winters praised. “She is as decorated as they come and we are looking forward to a big senior season from her.”

The 2022 Kee boys basketball team is fielding a squad of 19 competitors this spring, more than half of which bring with them varsity letterwinning experience from previous seasons. A total of 11 of this season’s competitors return this spring having competed for the Hawks at the varsity level, some of them bringing back experience at every high school competitor’s ultimate level of the State Track Meet.

That experienced near-dozen is headlined by a trio of seniors in Tyson Cota, Dalton Dibert and Damon Weber, with Cota and Weber bringing back that ultimate level of experience as field event competitors at last spring’s State Track Meet. Dibert brings back his own level of championship success as the top high jumper at last spring’s Upper Iowa Conference Meet.

A pair of senior boys basketball players from Allamakee County were among the 20 high school senior players to be honored for their efforts both on the basketball court and in the classroom by being named to the 2022 Iowa Basketball Coaches Association Academic All-State Team. Kee boys basketball senior Tyson Cota (at left in back row of photo at right) and Waukon boys basketball senior Braden Hemann (at right in front row of photo at right) were each chosen for the honor by the Iowa Basketball Coaches Association selection panel out of 140 applicants from across the state of Iowa and were honored with their peers during halftime of one of the Class 4A State Tournament semifinal games Thursday, March 10 at Wells Fargo Arena in Des Moines.

The 2021-2022 Kee girls basketball team played to a 7-15 season record, posting its lowest win total in over 10 years when the Lady Hawks recorded a 7-14 season mark during the 2010-2011 campaign. This year’s 7-15 overall mark included a 5-11 result in Upper Iowa Conference (UIC) play that placed the Kee girls in a tie for fifth place in the final UIC standings with a South Winneshiek squad the Lady Hawks split two games with during the regular season.

Despite having just nine players on this season’s roster - only six of whom were not playing in their first year of high school basketball, the Kee girls had several of their losses this season come by just single digits to teams from larger schools and that finished ahead of them in the final UIC team standings.

The 2021-2022 Waukon boys basketball season was much like putting a puzzle together, with each piece that was added making the team and its efforts more complete on the way to an 8-14 season record. A 0-5 start to the season eventually played to a 1-9 mark near its midpoint before ultimately finishing with a 7-5 result over the second half of this winter’s campaign.

Some of the early missing puzzle pieces for the basketball Tribe during that single-win first half of the season included a pair of its most experienced players who were nursing injuries from the extended football season this past fall and did not come back to the starting line-up until after the holiday break.

Included in that pair was a returning consistent contributor in a reserve role from last season in senior Lincoln Snitker, along with last season’s leading scorer and a four-year varsity starter in senior Braden Hemann.