A somewhat reluctant look ahead to the 2023-24 school year
I feel like I have this thought often when I finally have the space and time to hammer out the first column of the summer and I’m sure you’ve read this from me before.
Where has the first half of summer gone?
Sure, the standard calendar says there’s plenty of summer left. Labor Day weekend is seven weeks away and fall doesn’t officially start from a scientific sense until almost 10 weeks from now.
But daylight hours are already noticeably shrinking, back-to-school sales pitches are starting to pop up and we are about 10 days past July 4, which brings on that inevitable post-holiday mental slide where you feel the warmth of summer slipping away quickly. Well, maybe that last part is just Wisconsin’s over-reliance on air conditioning talking.
Here at the sports news desk the sobering reality is high school football practices, at least for the 11-player programs, start Aug. 1. Eight-player football, girls tennis and girls swim start a week later and the rest of the WIAA sports fill in shortly after that. As the calendar dates fall, this year brings the second-earliest possible starting dates for all of your fall sporting activities. Due to leap year, everything in 2024 rotates to the latest possible dates.
The older I get, the longer I wait to start looking ahead to the next school year. It’s all part of the illusion that maybe if I procrastinate, maybe that will slow time down and the more relaxed summer time will feel like it lasts longer. Of course, that never works and just creates more of a scramble mode in early August.
I’m about halfway through plugging teams’ fall schedules into my calendar. Some teams’ schedules I haven’t even looked at yet. I’ve barely started compiling composite conference schedules. I’ve fallen behind on creating space in my plethora of binders and file folders, many of which are busting at the seams with game stats, rosters and award winners from the past five years or so.
I actually didn’t take my first in-depth look at our three local high schools’ football schedules until two weeks ago. As usual, they don’t really mesh the way I’d like. It’d sure be nice for the conferences and athletic directors to ask for my opinions as to who should be home or who should take their far, far away trips to Ashland, Webster or Unity on a particular Friday night. (I kid about that, but then again, I kinda don’t, lol.)
As quickly as summers go by for us adults, they have to go by just as quickly for student-athletes, particularly the multi-sports kids, who are juggling between camps, open gyms, weight room workouts, summer leagues and tournaments, AAU games, Legion baseball, 7-on-7 football, you name it. Not to mention most of them are trying to make some money on the side.
There is a lot of truth to the adage, “there is no off-season.”
But summer certainly is the best time for individual improvement and when you do get a chance to see kids and teams in action at this time of year, it’s fun to see them evolve. The biggest mistake fans can do in thinking about the upcoming year is thinking about how individuals and teams looked the previous year. Prep athletes are still at an age where they can physically change so much in a short amount of time. And, of course, the older they get the more their understanding of their athletic craft and how their game works grows. New leaders also start to emerge, replacing the seniors that graduated in May.
It is always intriguing to see some of those transformations once August and September arrive –– which I won’t argue if those months aren’t ready to be here yet.
Once the 2023-24 school year kicks in, here are the most noteworthy items from the WIAA’s tournament assignments for fall and winter. Spring stuff is not out yet, but it likely won’t be too long until we start seeing some of those groupings.
One of the changes is for the first tournament we’ll see this fall. Medford’s girls tennis team was bumped to Division 1 for the first time since 2006 with the subsectional set for Rhinelander and the sectional at Eau Claire Memorial. Ouch.
The basketball brackets typically draw the highest intrigue and this year is no exception locally.
In Division 2, the Medford boys were in more of an eastern sectional halfbracket in 2022 and a western one last year. This year, the half-bracket is a hybrid that does not include the La Crossearea schools. A Medford/La Crosse Central matchup for the third straight year would only take place in the sectional final.
This year’s boys half-bracket takes a Hwy 29 and north approach, stretching from River Falls and New Richmond in the west to Hayward, Rice Lake and Ashland in the north to Antigo and Wausau East in the east. Interestingly, the other side of the sectional stretches from the La Crosse area to the Fox Valley.
The D2 girls bracket doesn’t include the La Crosse area at all as those teams move toward suburban Madison. Medford’s half-bracket is similar to the boys, but the sectional finalist will face a team from the northeastern part of the state in the sectional final –– quite possibly reigning three-time state champion Notre Dame.
In Division 5, the Rib Lake and Gilman boys are in the same half-bracket, but it looks a bit different than last year. While the entire sectional has basically the same teams as last year, except for Athens replacing McDonell, there is some shifting between the half-brackets with teams like Bayfield, Butternut, Drummond, Hurley, Mellen, Mercer and Winter now being potential early-round opponents for the Redmen and Pirates.
Gilman’s girls also see that in sectional one with Butternut, Drummond, Hurley, Mellen, Mercer, Prentice, South Shore, Washburn and Winter all switching to that half-bracket. Rib Lake remains on the east side of things in sectional two, but there’s a little more of a southern flavor to its half-bracket with teams like Pittsville, Greenwood and Loyal joining the party.
Medford’s Division 2 cross country sectional races are back at Colby on Oct. 21 after the Raiders spent a year at Black River Falls. All seven GNC teams will be there. The meet no longer has any of the La Crosse area/Coulee region teams. The Division 3 meet will be hosted by Solon Springs-Northwood after being much closer to home last fall in Phillips. Unity is the most notable addition to the field.
Medford’s Division 2 volleyball sectional half-bracket doesn’t change much with only Menominee Indian replacing New London. However, the other side of the sectional is a western grouping instead of the eastern grouping of last year with the final set to be played in Merrill. In Division 4, Rib Lake makes a sectional switch, moving westward and joining Gilman in Group B of sectional one, which includes mainly schools from the Lakeland and Cloverbelt conferences. The big news there and in Division 5 basketball is that McDonell Central has bumped up a division this year and won’t be a factor for Rib Lake and Gilman for once. With the success factor kicking in next year, the Macks may not be an issue for awhile in several sports.
Medford has been tabbed to host a WIAA Division 2 wrestling super regional on Feb. 10, with the top two teams advancing to the team sectional at Somerset. For once, the individual sectional tournament is close with Tomahawk serving as the host on Feb. 17. Abbotsford- Colby, Ashland, Bloomer-Colfax, McDonell-Elk Mound, Mondovi/Eleva-Strum, Mosinee, the Neillsville Co-op, the Osseo-Fairchild Co-op, Rhinelander, Spencer-Columbus, Stanley-Boyd and Tomahawk are in the super regional.
In Division 3, Cornell-Gilman-Lake Holcombe will see lots of Marawood schools at the Auburndale super regional. Edgar hosts the sectional meet again.
There are slight tweaks in the Division 3 boys soccer bracket. Shawano is in and Ashland is out in the Group B half-bracket that Medford is in. Ashland moves to Group A along with Somerset, replacing Altoona-Fall Creek and Amery.
In the Division 2 Antigo gymnastics sectional, Bloomer-Colfax is out and the Grantsburg Co-op is in.
Medford-Rib Lake’s girls hockey sectional bracket shrinks from seven to six teams with the merging of the Northern Edge and Northland Pines co-ops into an even larger conglomerate.
In Division 2 boys swimming at the Ashwaubenon sectional, Wausau East is out now that it is in a co-op with Wausau West. Pulaski and the Sturgeon Bay Co-op are in to create a 12-team meet.
Matt Frey is the Sports Editor at The Star News.
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