Sports SidelinesBy Gary Ridderbusch

SPORTSWEDNESDAY, JUNE 1, 2011 VILAS COUNTY NEWS-REVIEW/THE THREE LAKES NEWS 11A

Recreational facilities in the greater Eagle Riverarea took a huge step forward with the dedication ofOldenburg Sports Park on Saturday.

While there have been youth soccer fields for manyyears at the Highway G site, the expansion of the parkto include baseball and softball fields, additional soccerfields, expansive parking areas and a pavilion nowmake it a top-notch recreational facility.

Hats off to Wayne Oldenburg and the Vilas CountyBoard for making it all happen with the assistance ofthe Headwaters Youth Soccer Association, UnitedNorthwoods Soccer and Eagle River Baseball. Therewere also many volunteers involved, including DavidChamberlain who helped lead the expansion projectwith the assistance of county officials.

Oldenburg, owner of the Oldenburg Group, struck adeal that involved a land trade and $335,000 donation tothe county to develop the park. Oldenburg resides in Mil-waukee, but owns a large property in Conover. He reiter-ated Saturday that “it’s all about the kids and communi-ty.”

Part of the park development included moving thetwo ball fields from the Vilas County Fairgrounds tothe new recreational facility, though the fields stillneed dugouts and the softball field needs light forrecreational softball leagues played at night.

Once the overall condition of the soccer fields im-proves and the numbers permit, Chamberlain expectsthe facility will attract large youth soccer tournamentsto the area.

“These weekend-long events will be a great way togive positive exposure to our community and will be agood source of revenue for local businesses,” he said.Chamberlain also expects soccer and baseball campsand clinics will be the summer norm at the park.

“With the parking, new building and open spaces,the property lends itself well for a lot of possibilities,”said Chamberlain. Some examples of future develop-ment include a BMX bike track, Frisbee golf course,hiking trails, nature trails, fitness trails, cross-countryski trails, picnic areas and maybe even a small tentcamping area for use during tournaments.

The large pavilion includes rest rooms, a concessionsarea and storage areas for all the organizations usingthe park. There’s also a large kicking wall planned forthe west wall of the pavilions, complete with full-sizegoal frame and a custom-painted mural designed to en-gage and inspire young soccer players to kick the ball.

The way it looks now, the new Oldenburg SportsPark is definitely headed in the right direction.

Oldenburg Sports Parkheaded in right direction

The Northland Pines boystrack team took first place inthe WIAA Sectional meet inColby last Thursday, qualify-ing four athletes for the Statecompetition.

The six Eagles advancingto State are Rich Mork, CodyMcNeil, Mike Dobbs, JohnnySchwenn, Dylan Weber andSteven Voegel.

Pines took first place with53 points, placing ahead ofTomahawk with 52, Rice Lakewith 47.25 and 28 otherteams that competed in theSectional meet.

The 4x400-meter relayteam of Mork, Weber,Schwenn and McNeil tooksecond place with a time of3:29.39 to advance to State.

“The 4x400 is the last eventof the meet, so it seems themost exciting,” said Pines coachJohn Hayes. “In this case, if wewould have not taken secondplace or better, we would nothave won the meet. It was abuzzer beater and those boysran an amazing race.”

Mork was first in the 110-meter hurdles in 14.82 sec-onds. He was also first in the300-meter hurdles in 38.99seconds and the long jumpwith a leap of 22 feet.

“Richie had a great meet,”said Hayes. “With prelims, fi-nals and the 4x400, he had torun four different races andjuggle the long jump withtheir finals at the same time.He really is an amazing ath-lete to have on the team.”

McNeil not only ran anchorin the 4x400, he also took sixthin the open 400-meter dashwith a time of 52.64 seconds.

Schwenn ran a total of fiveraces. He ran preliminariesand finals in the 100- and

200-meter dashes, and ranthe third leg of the 4x400.

“Johnny just missed quali-fying in the 100-meter dash,running an 11.48 and comingin fifth place,” said Hayes.

Schwenn qualified forState in the 200-meter dash,taking second place and run-ning a 22.77.

“I was so proud of our sixState qualifiers,” said Hayes. “Iwas also very pleased that ourteam was able to win a Section-al championship.”

The WIAA State track com-petition will be Friday andSaturday, June 3 and 4, atMemorial Stadium at UW-LaCrosse.

Pines boys track teamSectional Champions

___________BY ANTHONY DREWNEWS-REVIEW ASST. EDITOR

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Johnny Schwenn heads for thefinish line. --STAFF PHOTO

The Northland Pines Ea-gles scored two runs in the topof the seventh inning to beatTomahawk 4-3 in a WIAA Di-vision 2 Regional baseballgame at Tomahawk last Fri-day.

“The team picked a greatday to put it all together, espe-cially at the plate.” said Pinescoach Brad Dodge. “We putthe ball in play 20 times andmost of them were hit prettyhard. We played great defenseand Mitch Steinke pitched agem. Put that all together anda team will usually come outon top.”

The Eagles rally in the sev-enth inning started with afour-pitch walk to senior An-drew Ambrosius. Junior Do-minic Caroselli then walked,after getting two early strikes,to put runners on first andsecond. Senior Taylor Ridder-busch then put down a sacri-fice bunt, advancing Ambro-sius and Caroselli to secondand third.

Ambrosius scored thetieing run on a single to left bysenior Billy Pfieffer andCaroselli was held at third.But Caroselli scored on a flyball to center by Steinke.

The Eagles, seeded fifth inthe Regional, held off fourth-seeded Tomahawk in the sev-enth inning to get the win.Steinke got three straightouts to finish the game.

Pines took a 1-0 lead in thetop of the first inning andadded a run in third to take a2-0 lead. Tomahawk took a 4-3lead in the bottom of thefourth inning after gettingseveral hard hits off ofSteinke.

“Mitch came in after thefourth inning when theyscored three to go ahead andhe said to me, ‘My fault, andthey won’t score again,’ ” saidDodge. “He buckled downafter that and shut themdown. I am very proud of theway he pitched today.”

Steinke scattered four hits,walked one and struck outfive on the day.

Defensively, Jake Schlitthad eight put-outs in right

field.“Jake was everywhere

today,” said Dodge. “I’m veryproud of a sophomore step-ping up like that in a biggame. The team only had oneerror and that ball was hitvery hard and could havebeen called a hit.”

Pfeifer led the Eagles’ of-fensive attack with three sin-gles and the game-tieing RBI— all on a badly sprainedankle suffered in practice twodays before.

“It was very questionablewhether Billy would play atall,” said Dodge.

Ridderbusch singled, stolea base and scored in the firstinning and doubled later inthe game. Steinke singled andhit the game-winning sacri-fice fly. T.J. Harsla doubled,Wallace walked and scoredand hit the ball hard a few

times right back to the pitcherMatt Goska singled andwalked, and Ambrosiuswalked and scored the game-tieing run in the seventh.

“We did a great job of com-ing back and taking this gamefrom them in a very excitingenvironment,” said Dodge.“The stadium was packedwith Tomahawk’s and ourfans and we found a way tocome out on top. I’m veryproud of these guys.”

The Eagles were scheduledto play at top-seeded Mosineeon Tuesday of this week. Thewinner will advance to the theRegional final Wednesday,June 1, against the winner ofthe Medford and Wittenburg-Birnamwood game.

The Eagles also faced Med-ford in the final Great North-ern Conference game lastTuesday, losing 2-0 on Senior

Night at Pines.“The bottom line in this

game was we ran into one ofthe best pitchers in the confer-ence who thrives upon keep-ing the ball low and gettingbatters to chase the low andoutside curve,” said Dodge.

The Eagles only had twohits (Ambrosius and Harsla),but put the ball in play consid-ering the good pitching.

“We had trouble movingrunners the whole game, butwe had two very good chancesto tie or go ahead toward theend of the game,” said Dodge.“We had the tieing run on sec-ond base twice, but he pitchedhis way out of the jam bothtimes,” said Dodge.

Steinke pitched for the Ea-gles, only allowing four hitsand scattering a few walksand struck out five. He gaveup two runs; only one earned.

Eagles beat Hatchets 4-3 in Regional

Northland Pines junior Dominic Caroselli scoresthe winning run in the WIAA Regional win over

Tomahawk last Friday. On-deck batter BrandonWallace watches the action. --STAFF PHOTOS

Northland Pines players celebrated their come-from-behind Re-gional win over Tomahawk.

Northland Pines senior first baseman Andrew Ambrosius cele-brates after making the final out against Tomahawk.

After finishing fourth placein the Northern Lakes Confer-nce, the Three Lakes baseballseason came to a close with a15-8 loss to Laona-Wabeno inlast Thursday’s WIAA Region-al game.

“During the season weshowed glimpses of some ex-ceptional ability to play ball,”said Three Lakes coach JeffLiebscher. “However, we could

never stay on a roll with it.The problems that we encoun-tered all season reared theirugly heads in grand fashionon Thursday evening.”

The Bluejays’ troublesbegan in the first inning, fol-lowing an easy flyball outfrom the first Rebel batter.

“It should have been a one,two, three inning, but insteadthey ended up with two un-earned runs,” said Liebscher.

The Three Lakes offensemanaged to take a 5-3 lead

that held into the fourth in-ning, but errors on the defen-sive side of the ball took theirtoll.

“From that point on, wejust fell apart,” said Liebscher.“We had a lot of trouble pitch-ing strikes, and when we didmake them swing the bat, ourdefense let us down. It wasone of those perfect stormsand we were on the receivingend of it.”

In all, the Jays committedeight errors and walked 12

Rebel batters. Offensively,Three Lakes struck out 11times and left 13 runners onbase, while mustering ninehits against the same pitcherthey hit hard a week earlier.

“This game is a great lessonfor all of the kids who will bereturning next season aboutbeing mentally prepared forevery game and never takingany opponent lightly,” saidLiebscher. “For the outgoingseniors, it’s an unfortunateway to end their high schoolcareer.”

Jays end baseball season with loss to Rebels at home___________

BY ANTHONY DREWNEWS-REVIEW ASST. EDITOR

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