FFA Turkey Bowling...and church (VIDEOS)

Among a variety of activities that took place last week at B-B-E high school, the FFA chapter hosted turkey bowling on Friday in the CTE wing.

Here's a video that includes Mrs. Floura, science teacher, giving it a shot at turkey bowling:


The Brooten city council meets tonight in regular session. Tomorrow night, the B-B-E Jaguars boys' basketball team hosts Paynesville in a border battle. The Bulldogs are 15-10 overall and 10-3 in the Central Minnesota Conference. This puts them in a tie for second place with Kimball Area. Holdingford (22-3) is 12-1 in the CMC and has clinched the title alone. The Jaguars are 9-15 overall and 6-7 in the CMC, good for a tie for fourth place with Atwater-Cosmos-Grove City.

And some church news...
On Sunday (yesterday), Pastor Jeanne Megorden provided a splendid children's sermon at West Lake Johanna Lutheran church, which is located southwest of Brooten in Gilchrist Township. This children's sermon was also given at Trinity Lutheran in Brooten. The video attached below includes the bulk of worship held at West Lake Johanna.

Pastor Jeanne's children's sermon begins at about the 8:40 mark:


I have college basketball news to post in this blog post later this afternoon.

College news...
Two former B-B-E girls' basketball teammates will square off on Saturday in Thief River Falls in the NJCAA Division III Region 13 tournament. Northland Community and Technical College is the site for the region tournament, and the host NCTC Pioneers women's basketball team is the No. 1 seed. They face No. 4-seeded St. Cloud Technical and Community College at 1 p.m. in the first of four semifinal games. The Region 13 tournament features other semifinal games divided into "A" and "B" sides of the bracket. Playing for NCTC is Class of 2023 graduate Tiyana Schwinghammer, and playing for SCTCC is Class of 2024 graduate Brooklyn Fischer.

On Friday this week, Ridgewater College's women's basketball team faces Minnesota North College-Vermillion in a Region 13A play-in round game. This game will also be hosted at NCTC in Thief River Falls. Tip-off is at 6 p.m. B-B-E Class of 2024 graduate Grace Jackson plays for Ridgewater.

More to come later tonight.

B-B-E FFA Tractorcade gets underway (VIDEOS)...and baseball wins

The B-B-E high school's FFA chapter is holding a tractorcade today to honor area farmers and provide a great way for multiple generations of agriculture-minded men and women to band together for a common purpose. Donations are being accepted at the conclusion of the event that will be donated to the Katie Reitsma family of rural Padua.

Here's the start of the tractorcade after they organized at the high school parking lot this morning:


I have to catch up to baseball now. The Jaguars are hosting Kimball Area in Spring Hill. The doubleheader started at 10 a.m.

UPDATE: the Jaguars went 2-0 today against visiting Kimball Area. They won the second game by a 10-4 score. In game one, the Jaguars earned a 6-0 shutout victory to forge a three-game winning streak. Talen Kampsen got the complete-game pitching win in game one. Hayden Sobiech and Kaden DeRoo split pitching duties in game two. B-B-E is now 4-2 overall and 4-2 in the Central Minnesota Conference. The Cubs fall to 3-4 overall (3-3 CMC). They had just swept A-C-GC by scores of 13-5 and 13-3 on Thursday in St. Cloud.

*Here's video posted on Sunday that features action from game 2 against Kimball in the bottom of the 5th inning:


In game two, Hayden Sobiech started and pitched six innings (7 strikeouts, 2 walks, 5 hits, 1 earned run).

Today has been fairly busy. Don't forget about tonight's steak and pork chop feed at the Belgrade V.F.W.! They serve from 5 to 7:30 p.m. This is a great weekend to support our local service organizations. The Sedan Fire and Rescue squad hosted a fun-filled meat raffle last night at Heidi's Bar. Organizers were pleased with the turnout.

(HD VIDEO) Blast from the Past: FFA milk drinking contest

If you click on the following link, you'll be able to watch a high-definition (1080p) video taken on February 24, 2016 during National FFA Week. On that day, B-B-E's FFA chapter held a milk drinking contest at lunch. Click here: https://bit.ly/3jn3lax.

It's a neat video with one of the underclassmen who served as a tri-captain of Josey Tensen's final wrestling team during his senior year at B-B-E. (Colby Schramel) Tri-captains that year were Tensen, Schramel and Kaleb Voss.

Kinda funny, right as I was thinking to myself, "Colby must have not been too concerned about making weight for state that week." And then a second later, Spencer Amundson walks up to Colby and says something about "making weight tomorrow" - this exchange happens in the final seconds of the video clip.

On Thursday, February 25, 2016, state-bound wrestlers had an official weigh-in prior to the Class 1A state tournament in St. Paul.

Schramel competed at the state tournament in 2015 and 2016...so on that Thursday of FFA week in 2016, he certainly made weight! He had a very memorable trip to state in his senior year and earned a sixth-place medal. In the state quarterfinals, he earned one of the tournament's biggest upsets by defeating No. 1-seeded Dietrich Balsbaugh of Trinity School of River Ridge. Balsbaugh was 40-1 entering the state quarterfinals, but Schramel earned a late takedown to beat him by a 4-3 decision and land a spot in the state semifinals. Schramel met junior Bailee O’Reilly of Goodhue and lost a 6-3 decision, although he had a chance at a takedown in the third period that could have sealed a win.

In the wrestlebacks, Schramel lost by fall (3:49) to senior Michael Preuss (39-9) of Adrian. Then in the fifth-place match, Schramel lost a 5-3 decision in overtime and finished with a season record of 34-7 with two state trips in his career at B-B-E.

This is FFA month! National FFA Week this year is February 20 to February 27. We'll get coverage of BBE FFA week in the Bonanza Valley Voice starting next week.

We continue mourning the passing of Josey Tensen. The devastation felt from that will not go away any time soon.