Category: Sports

With the retirement of Nate Harrington, the Lions welcome Derek Asche as the new head football coach.

Although this is Asche’s first year as head coach, he is not new to the Providence football community. From 2006-2011, he served as the Quarterback Coach and last season was promoted to Offensive Coordinator.

Additionally, Asche has his own experience with football, playing under the late coach Roger Lipelt.

“I grew up playing Quarterback for Wayzata starting in 4th Grade all the way through high school,” says Asche.

Translating his personal skills into coaching, Asche is working with an extremely young team, with only three senior representatives.

Coach Asche explained how he will develop the team.

“We always start at the beginning with the basics,” he said. “We create a strong foundation from which we will build and take each day one at a time.”

Knowing that their young age will be a challenge during the season, the players worked to improve their skills and relationships with each other.

“We have had the most participation in off season training this past year than any other year. But this team is really special in that they always want to do right by each other, that they are close to each other like brothers (and some are!),” said Asche.

The team is currently 1-1, with a win against St. Agnes, and a loss to Concordia. As the season progresses, Asche said practices will be more focused on strategics.

“Before our first game and during two a days practices, we focus on technique, football fundamentals, and our offense, defense, and special teams systems.  Once games begin, we focus on how those systems apply to the upcoming opponent.  Each week we work on offense, defense, and special teams and run our opponents offensive and defensive schemes against ourselves,” said Asche.

A new coach means that players have to adjust to a new coaching style. The team is learning how Coach Asche and Harrington differ from one another.

“Coach Harrington is a strong leader who was always dedicated to the team, both players and coaches alike. I hope I am just like him in those ways.  I think I am more likely to use sarcasm and humor to get my point across though,” said Asche.

Aside from improvement in the sport of football, Coach Asche says his goal is to have the students represent God, their family and Providence the best they can.

“Of course, a part of athletics and competition is playing to win, and we want to win as many games as possible. High school athletics is also a journey that lasts a short time and I hope each player grows in faith, maturity, and responsibility and eventually leaves the high school “athletic arena” with tools that will assist them in life such as teamwork, dedication, and perseverance,” said Asche.

Alarm clocks are blaring at early hours of the morning, there is an increase in caffeine intake, and extreme mental and physical exhaustion are apparent…all this before the first day of school.

On August twelfth, Providence athletes made their way out to tryouts, marking the beginning of the Minnesota Fall sports season. For the last two weeks, they have been working to impress their coaches, getting back into shape, and becoming familiar with their new team. All of the teams have already played in competitive games or scrimmages. A significant portion of the season takes place before school begins, which is a critical time in any team’s development.

Girls Volleyball

Heading into tryouts, the girls volleyball players knew they would have a young team, losing nine seniors. Half of the team is composed of girls who were previously on JV.

Heather Leuer ‘14 states, “Our main focus this first week was getting everyone on the same page. Whenever you have a new group of girls it’s important to get them to learn how everyone else plays, so we can play as a team instead of individuals.”

In practice, heavy emphasis has been put on practicing blocking and passing. After losing a close game to Heritage Christian Academy, (3-2) Leuer expects that adjusting these areas will give the team opportunity for major growth.

“Friday’s game was a good loss against a good team; We have no reason to feel poorly about ourselves. Everyone is excited to get back to it, and fix the problems in preparation for future games,” states Leur.

Cross Country

The Providence Cross Country team is working on building a strong team through recruiting runners with a dedicated interest in the sport.  After losing eleven seniors, the team is trying to fill the missing spots.

“The focus this year is creating a hardworking team that encourages the younger kids to stick with the team for the years to come,” states Jenny Walz ’14.

The first race of the season was against Anoka High School. One of the challenges in this race was dealing with the extremely uncomfortable heat with temperatures reaching the high 90’s.

Staying positive, Walz states, “I think it was good to help us get an idea of the younger kids abilities.”

Boys Soccer

Only losing two Seniors, the Boys Soccer team is looking forward to a strong season, having played many years together.

The team traveled to Duluth to play two of their first season games. The boys tied Hermantown 1-1  and beat Superior 3-0.

Luke Ziesmer ’14 states, “What I took away from these first games was that our offense needs to finish our opportunities. We have a very strong defense this year, and I believe that will be a large factor for a successful season.”

In practice, the boys have been working on playing one-touch soccer, playing smart, and by scoring on every chance they have.

In the future, Ziesmer believes, “We will likely prepare differently for the next games because we play better teams than the teams we played this past weekend. Our team possession will have to be better against them.”

Girls Soccer

Similar to  boys soccer, the girls are also are an experienced team, only losing one senior.

The first game of the season was against Orono High School, who the girls lost to in sections in  the 2012 season. This year, Orono squeaked by and beat Providence, with a score of 1-0.

“This is the best we’ve ever done against Orono and it gives us a really good outlook for the rest of the season. We’re hoping the rest of the season goes just as well as it started off,” states Paige McAuliffe ’14.

After coming so close to winning their first game, the girls’ soccer players are determined to attain positive results.

“Our focus has been bonding as a team. We have incredible players and now we just need to be able to work together,” says McAuliffe.

Football

The pressure is on for the boys football team who made it to the section finals last season, losing in a close overtime game. This year, there are five returning players who have starting experience.

“The focus in practice early on is to define the roles of all the players and to implement the offense, defense and special teams,” states Conor White’ 13

On August 24th, the team was able to get in a competitive mindset in a series of scrimmages against Blake, St. Paul Harding, Patrick Henry and the Rockford Area Schools District.

Of what he took away from the scrimmages, White stated, “We are deep in both offensive and defensive lines and are athletes that can make plays in space.”

The first game of the season is Friday August 30th, in an away games versus St. Agnes.

“We are preparing quite well for our first game and have a few kinks to work out, but we feel very confident entering the season,” states White.

Girls Tennis

Although the girls did not lose any seniors, the team welcomed four new players to their squad.

“This year we are focusing on conditioning to build up our stamina for match play,” states Lauren Athmann’ 13.

The girls played their first tournament at Glenco-Silver Lake High School. The team lost to centennial 1-6 but defeated Glenco 7-0.

“I was happy with how we all played, but we need to improve our mental game for upcoming matches,” states Athmann.

 

The 2013-2014 school year kicked-off August 28th, signifying the beginning of homework and the deadline for that neglected summer reading, but for fall sports athletes, the pressure has been felt long before school even started.

 

 

In close game against Delano May 29th, the Providence boys’ baseball team lost their first section game. The Lions cannot lose another game, or they will be eliminated from the tournament.

After two successful section games, the number two seeded Lions played the number one seed Delano, in the sub section finals. The Delano Tigers had an early lead in the bottom of the third inning, scoring four runs. PA rallied back with their own four runs the next inning, tying the game. The score went back and forth throughout the game. In the end, Providence lost by three runs, with a final score of 9-12.

In baseball, to be eliminated from the tournament, you have to lose twice. On May 30th, the Lions had a chance to remain in the section tournament, when they played Mound-Westonka, winning 3-2. On Monday June third, the boys will be playing against Dassel-Cokato.

In the regular season, the boys had a record of 5 wins and 4 losses.

“I feel like this season started off slow, but as we progressed, we learned how to dominate as a team,” stated Nick Pruden ’14.

Because of their early season losses, the boys learned from their mistakes what they needed to improve on.

“We needed to improve on getting focused before games,” says Pruden.

Over the season, a team gets gradually closer and more comfortable with each other.

“We have bonded as a team, throughout the wins and losses, but mostly the wins,” stated Jesse Barron ’15.

By their first section game against Brooklyn Center, the boys came into the game with a new attitude, determined to win. The result was a 11-0 victory.

“We won 11-0. We had a no hitter going into the bottom of the seventh,” states Barron.

The baseball team also defeated Fridley in the second section game, winning 3-0.

After these games, the boys fell to Delano, but then regained their strength to win the next two games.

The section games were important, but the boys had fun playing in one particular regular season game.

“My favorite game this year was Breck, because who doesn’t like beating Breck,” stated Pruden.

Nine seniors were a part of the Providence baseball program. Next year, the six remaining players will have to get used to a whole new team.

“I am really going to miss my senior buddies next year,” states Pruden.

Providence Academy 2013 Track team wraps up another eventful and succesful season. This Thursday May 30th and this Saturday June 1st the team will particpate in sections, hoping to continue their season.   After a delayed and shortened season due to the unpredictable weather, the team still came out with a strong noteworthy season.

Trent Wiebusch ‘15  said “The track season was cut short because of the weather, but everyone has had a great season and the team is looking forward to the section meet this Saturday, June 1st.

This years track team will have to say goodbye to the loyal seniors who have been a part of track for many years. The team says goodbye to seniors Michael Warren, Michael Paulus, Jack Claseman, Maddie Murphy, and Nathalie Ratliff as they move on to bigger and better things.

The team is looking forward to another successful year in the tri-metro conference for the 2014 track season.

Fresh air; warm sun; breezy wind; cool waters.  These are some words that may come to mind when thinking of sailing.

But mother nature had other ideas for Minnesota sailing teams this past season.

Fresh air? More like frostbite.

Warm sun? Nonexistent.

Breezy wind? A high school student at Benilde went into hypothermic shock.

Cool waters? Frozen lakes, to be exact.

So with Minnesota snow and ice all the way up through May, what happened to sailing?

According to Charlie Christianson, ’13, “The season started off rough with a late ice out. Eventually we did get out on the lake, dodging ice for the first few weeks. Once the ice cleared, we started practicing like we normally would.”

Though the weather was not ideal in the least, the sailing team embraced the merciless weather, and faced the waters with a determined attitude.  After practicing in semi-normal conditions for a while, the sailing team headed to multiple regattas, which are boat races, and ended their season at co-ed state.

“All in all,” Christianson concluded, “It was a short but good season.”

There you have it. Hopefully next year the lakes will not be frozen in the middle of spring, but if they are, the sailing team has a year of experience under their belt.