Editor’s note: The following information was provided by the Whitewater Unified School District.
Whitewater advances to Gold Bracket play on Saturday, August 28 at the UWW Warhawk Invitational. The Whippets defeated Kenosha Tremper, Beloit Memorial, and Palmyra-Eagle. In the last match on Friday Whitewater fell to the #1 seed of the tourney, Waterloo. #1family
The Whippet Volleyball Team played Stoughton twice on Tuesday, August 24th, at Whitewater High School. Here are some game highlights! We are super proud of you ladies!
In the first match, Whitewater defeated Stoughton 2-1 by the scores of 23-25, 25-15, and 25-15.
Stat Leaders:
Aces: Calli Grosinske with 5
Kills: Kindyl Kilar with 13
Digs: Kindyl Kilar with 14 and Caleigh Yang with 10
Highlights: http://www.hudl.com/v/2Ff2TY
In the second match of the night against Stoughton, the Whippets lost 1-2 with scores of 25-15, 18-25, and 11-15.
Stat Leaders:
Aces: Jenna Pope with 3
Kills: Kindyl Kilar with 17
Digs: Caleigh Yang with 7, Kindyl Kilar with 6, Calli Grosinske with 5
Highlights: http://www.hudl.com/v/2Ff3eJ
As a staff we were pleased with the performance of the team for the most part. We did very well serving, but we need to continue to get stronger with our serve receive, blocking, and finishing a match by not allowing our opponents to go on a 3-4-5 point run.
Article submitted by Kathy Bullis
Whitewater High School Head Volleyball Coach
kbullis@wwusd.org
An article (click here) in the Lake Geneva Regional News on August 24 begins as follows: “During the past decade, Big Foot has owned Whitewater.
The two football teams played seven times from 2012 to 2019 and the Chiefs won all seven—and all of them by at least 15 points.
That streak of dominance ended on Aug. 20 when the Whippets beat Big Foot 24-19 in the teams’ season opener at UW-Whitewater’s Perkins Stadium.”
Big Foot head coach Mike Welden is quoted as saying, “It’s probably a little eye-opener for our juniors and seniors, who hadn’t really ever lost to Whitewater. That’s a vastly improved Whitewater team, all credit to Coach Bleck out there.”
Editor’s note: The following information was provided by UW-Whitewater.
Mackenzie Balanganayi, a native of Whitewater, WI, was one of four members of the University of Wisconsin-Whitewater football team who have been selected to D3football.com’s 2021 Preseason All-America team.
Senior offensive linemen Kyle Gannon (Waukesha, Wis./West) and senior defensive lineman Mackenzie Balanganayi (Palatine, Ill./Palatine) garnered first team accolades. Senior defensive back Mark McGrath (Lisle, Ill./Lisle) and senior running back Alex Peete (Ringwood, Ill./Johnsburg) earned second team honors.
All four players helped the Warhawks finish with a 13-2 record in 2019, including a 6-1 mark in the Wisconsin Intercollegiate Athletic Conference. The team won the WIAC championship for the 37th time and reached the Stagg Bowl (NCAA Division III national championship game) for the 10th time in program history.
Gannon helped the Warhawks average 30.1 points per game and a conference-leading 195.7 rushing yards per game in 2019. He collected second team D3football.com All-West Region and first team All-WIAC recognition. In 2020-21, Gannon was selected second team Academic All-America by the College Sports Information Directors of America.
Balanganayi, the 2019 WIAC Defensive Player of the Year and D3football.com West Region Defensive Player of the Year, totaled 42 tackles, including nine sacks. He finished the year as a second team D3football.com All-American. In 2020-21, he was named a National Strength and Conditioing Association All-American for his commitment to strength and conditioning.
McGrath joined Balanganayi on the All-America second team in 2019 with 59 tackles and three blocked kicks. Peete, a 2018 D3football.com second team All-American and 2019 first team All-WIAC and D3football.com All-West Region running back, tallied 14 rushing touchdowns and rushed for more than 1,000 yards for the second straight year in 2019.
UW-Whitewater’s 2020 season was canceled due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Gannon, Balanganayi and McGrath were each named 2020 Preseason All-Americans, and were joined by linebacker Kaleb Kaminski offensive lineman Quinn Meinerz.
The Warhawks’ 2021 campaign kicks off Saturday, Sept. 4, at Perkins Stadium against Carthage.
Editor’s note: Thanks to Bob Mischka for this report and photos.
The Whippets opened their 2021 football season with a hard-fought 24-19 win over Big Foot played at the UW-W Perkins Stadium on Friday, August 20. Senior quarterback Brock Grosinske completed 6 of 16 passes for 112 yards and ran for 59 yards and 3 TDs. Senior running back Carter Friend carried 32 times for 155 yards and 1 TD. Next up is a non-conference game at Portage on Friday, August 27.
The 2021 Whippet Booster Club Cookout and Membership Drive will take place on Friday, September 10th at WHS (please see flyer). Since we were not able to host this event last fall, it is exciting to get this popular event rolling once again.
Please consider joining the fun on the 10th by enjoying a cookout prior to the Whippet varsity football game. This is also the same night for the new field dedication, so there will be all sorts of excitement.
While enjoying a burger or hot dog meal for $8.00, consider becoming a member of the Whippet Booster Club by signing up for a membership. The Booster Club has contributed significant funds in support of Whippet Athletics thanks to our various fundraisers, and memberships are one of those fundraisers.
Submitted by Elvia MezaKlosinski
Whippet Booster Club
The Whitewater High School Booster Club would like to thank Dalee Water Conditioning for their generous donation of a pallet of water bottles!
Thank you submitted by Elvia Meza Klosinski, Whippet Booster Club
WHS Varsity football faces Big Foot at UW-W Perkins Stadium on Friday, August 21 at 7:00 p.m. It’s “Youth Night.”
Editor’s note: The following information was provided by UW-Whitewater.
More chariot than chair, propelled by calloused hands, steered by torso muscle, careening, crashing, then pirouetting on a wheel, Warhawk wheelchair basketball athletes will go for gold at the summer Paralympics, Aug. 24 to Sept. 5, in Tokyo, Japan. University of Wisconsin-Whitewater players and coaches, women and men, past and present, have grown this sport. Some will participate on the court. Others will be there in spirit and influence.
Friends and rivals
Former Warhawks Mariska Beijer (playing for the Netherlands) and Lindsey Zurbrugg (United States), will face one another in the first game for both countries on Aug. 24.
When they met at UW-Whitewater, Zurbrugg was a freshman from Oregon and Beijer, a senior, was starting her final semester. They quickly hit it off, joking around, watching Disney movies and making apple pie in the kitchen of the campus residence hall where they lived. Zurbrugg, always competitive, thrived on Beijer’s basketball intensity, finding a kindred spirit and mentor.
“Her (Beijer’s) personality, her work ethic are unparalleled,” said Zurbrugg. “She took me under her wing. I learned the way she did it. A lot of my work ethic and the intensity that I play with comes from her. I saw her being successful and I wanted to be successful.”
“It will be intense,” said Zurbrugg of the Paralympics. “When you look at the higher levels of wheelchair basketball and the ball movement and the defense, it’s just poetry in motion. It becomes more like a chess game and a mind game than just a skill game. Everybody’s at that high skill level now, and so it’s about outthinking your opponent.”
On women’s Team USA, the Warhawk connection doesn’t stop with Zurbrugg. With her is Ixhelt Gonzalez, 17, a high school junior from Chicago who attended summer Warhawk wheelchair basketball camps. In addition to Beijer, recent Warhawks who will play for their home countries’ teams include Sammy White, Australia, and Andre Bienek and Mareike Miller, of the German men’s and women’s teams respectively.
Five of the 12 players on the U.S. men’s national team are former Warhawks: Jake Williams, Matt Scott, Matt Lesperance, Nate Hinze and John Boie. Head men’s Team USA coach Ron Lykins coached the Warhawks in the late 1980s and early ‘90s and contributed to their dominance. Lykins recently hired Warhawk head women’s basketball coach Christina Schwab as an assistant coach.
The men’s team opens their Paralympics play on Aug. 25 against the German team and Bienek. The U.S. and Australia are in the same bracket, so the Warhawks on Team USA could face White and the Australians as well.
Overcoming a challenging year
In 2019, Boie was on the U.S. men’s national team which won the gold medal at the Parapan Games in Peru. The win gave Team USA an automatic berth at the 2020 Paralympics in Tokyo. When the COVID-19 pandemic hit and the Olympics and Paralympics were delayed until 2021, Boie said the news was “devastating” to the athletes.
“You’re trying to peak as an athlete at a certain time so you can perform at your best,” said Boie. “It was a struggle mentally to stick with it and physically, because access to equipment and gyms just wasn’t the same.”
After playing in a national tournament in March 2020, a year would pass before Boie faced another opponent on a basketball court. He decided to deal with a nagging shoulder injury and have surgery. In April of this year, Boie moved into a residence hall at the Olympic and Paralympic Training Center in Colorado Springs, Colorado, where his daily routine included online office hours for his job as an academic advisor at UW-Whitewater, physical therapy for his shoulder, weightlifting, practicing his basketball skills and strengthening his mind and body.
“It’s a dream that we’re training for,” said Boie. “It’s a dream that provides no promises whatsoever. But if you don’t train, if you don’t try to push yourself, you’re a hundred percent not going to win.”
Three golds and counting
Christina Schwab, head coach of the Warhawk women’s wheelchair basketball team was picked by Lykins to be an assistant coach on the U.S. men’s national team in the Tokyo Paralympics. It will be Schwab’s sixth Paralympics since 2000. She has reported for duty as a basketball player, track athlete and now, a coach. The three gold medals Schwab owns all come from playing wheelchair basketball on U.S. women’s national teams at the games in Rio de Janeiro, Athens and Beijing.
“The first time you get your USA jersey and the ‘USA’ is across your chest when you put it on, there is no greater sense of pride,” said Schwab. “You’ve worked this hard. Your coaches believe in you. Your teammates believe in you. You get to represent your country.”
“If I have any athletes who come to this program (at Whitewater) and want to be at that level, I will strive to do my best to help them get there,” she said.
At only 15 years old in 1996, Schwab was picked as a Team USA alternate for the Atlanta Paralympics. Four years later at Sydney, she played on an up-and-coming but evolving Team USA that failed to win a medal.
A breakthrough came in 2004 at the Athens Paralympics when a scrappy American team faltered early, then fought through the field to beat powerhouse Canada in the semi and win gold in the final. At Beijing in 2008, Team USA defended its title and Schwab earned a second gold medal. An all-around athlete, Schwab competed in distance races, including a marathon, in 2012 in London. She returned to wheelchair basketball in 2016 at Rio where both men’s and women’s U.S. teams won gold. Schwab came home with a third gold medal.
Schwab was 12 years old when she first saw Lykins at a Warhawk wheelchair sports camp in 1993. He was head coach of Warhawk wheelchair basketball but soon would leave to work with men’s and women’s international wheelchair basketball teams. When Schwab began competing at that level, Lykins was already there coaching Paralympians. Now a new chapter is opening for them.
“It’s an awesome opportunity to have a veteran squad,” she said of the men’s national team. “They’ve been playing together, the majority of them for about nine years. They feed off of each other. They know each other’s tendencies. Right now, it’s about refining, perfecting and fine tuning.”
All of the athletes come to the Paralympics with their own life stories. Schwab lives with the spina bifida she has had from birth. She’s an athlete, college coach, wife, and mother of two young children. As a child, Boie survived a farm accident. Now he’s representing the U.S. as a Paralympian.
When an undetected spinal defect caused her paralysis, Zurbrugg was active in sports and loved to compete. She found a new way to run.
“A basketball chair, as soon as I hop into that, it’s a whole new world where I can go fast again,” said Zurbrugg. “I could feel a breeze on my face. I could be athletic again. I wanted to be competitive. I wanted to be athletic.”
If you have heard of Chris Evert, Tracy Austin, Lindsay Davenport, all had played in the iconic USTA Junior National Championship finals. There were over 275 tennis players that participated in San Diego, California, at the USTA Billie Jean King Girls 18s National Championships from August 8-15, 2021. All players in the 18s division had the opportunity to earn a wild card berth in the main draw of this year’s U.S. Open.
Reese Brantmeier won the 16s national title two years ago and now had to play some of the top players in the country to get to the finals. Ms. Brantmeier was seeking to become the first player to claim both age titles since 2011.
Reese advanced to the semi-finals in the singles competition and had to take on Robin Montgomery of Washington D.C., the #1 seed heading into the tournament. However, Reese won a tough match against Montgomery 6-0,6-7(3),6-3 to advance to the finals.
The packed Barnes Tennis Center was excited to see the USTA finals match between Reese and Ashlynn Krueger of Lewisville, Texas. It was a hard-fought match that lasted two hours and eight minutes. The second set was intense. There were no service breaks in the second set. One newspaper reported several of the serves were over 100 mph. Unfortunately, Kreuger defeated Brantmeier 6-2,7-6 (3).
Despite the loss in the USTA finals, Reese earned a qualifying bid to participate in the U.S. Open. Quite an honor for the 16-year-old from Whitewater, Wisconsin.
Reese also had a successful tournament in doubles. She teamed up with Kimberly Hance of Torrance, California, to advance the tournament’s semi-finals before losing to the eventual champion. The doubles team of Brantmeier and Hance took home third place to end the successful two weeks of competition.
Reese would also receive the USTA Sportsmanship award for 2021. The last tennis player to advance to the USTA National Finals in singles from Wisconsin was Tami Whitlinger from Neenah, Wisconsin, in 1986.
Reese is the daughter of Scott and Becky Brantmeier of Whitewater.
Article Submitted by Greg Stewart
Photo Credit: J. Fred Sidhu