Peterson: A definite case of mind over matter

October 30, 2019

Some years ago, there was a basketball player at Bergland High School by the name of Neil Kalember. A smooth lefthanded shooter, Kalember helped the Vikings to a couple of district titles and a berth in the U.P. regional finals as a sophomore. But early in his senior season, Kalember suffered a broken arm and missed the entire campaign While we had been opponents, I hadn’t seen him until many years later at Lake Gogebic while vacationing. We got to reminiscing about our past days on the court and I asked him about the season he lost to injury. “It was the longest winter of my ...

Karnosky: Running hockey rentals is hard

October 28, 2019

When my family first moved to Houghton in the late summer of 1983, my parents, who did not grow up with the sport, but instead fell in love with it while falling in love with each other during their time at the University of Wisconsin, bought season tickets to Michigan Tech hockey games. In that first year, I got to see Brett Hull play for Minnesota-Duluth, I also had the chance to see Tom Kurvers, Norm Maciver and Jim Johnson on that Bulldogs squad. Wisconsin had the likes of Tony Granato and David Maley. North Dakota featured Perry Berezan and Rick Zombo along with future Bulldogs ...

Local is focus for FU football/Paul Peterson

September 4, 2019

There’s an old saying that the family that sticks together stays together. That particular philosophy has been adopted full-bore by the Finlandia University and Hancock High football teams. The Lions are hoping to gain the support of Hancock sports fans — and those in the Copper Country — with a six-game home schedule this fall. “We consider the entire four-county area as our main area for recruiting,” Lions coach Travis Wiltzius said earlier this year. “We hope that playing six games at home in 2019 will help in that respect.” Wiltzius, who went winless in his ...

Football season here again

August 28, 2019

It seemed like just yesterday that the football season came to an end. But here we are again with another season upon us. The high school grid season gets underway Thursday night with a couple of games on the schedule. The most interesting one locally is the meeting of L’Anse and Hancock at McAfee Field. Both teams have hopes of reversing their fortunes from a year ago, but more on that later. With the exception of Calumet, which was undefeated in the regular season, 2018 was not a good one in the Copper Country. Hancock, which went to the playoffs in 2017, lost a number of ...

That time of year

August 27, 2019

With the sounds of whistles blowing, coaching shouting, and feet hitting the turf or gym floor, it can only mean one thing: fall sports season. Last weekend saw some of the area high school volleyball teams take the court for preseason tournaments. Credit goes out to both Calumet and Lake Linden-Hubbell for strong showings as both took second in their respective invites. Thursday marks the opening of the high school football season. Calumet, L’Anse, Hancock, Houghton and Ontonagon all hit the turf that night with the Lakes joining the fray on Saturday. Calumet, of course, is ...

Another camp on a long list

August 21, 2019

Just the other day, I had the chance to take in football summer drills at L’Anse High. If there was a bit of deja vu involved, that could be understood because my first experience with football drills took place 47 years ago in the same town. Life in general, was much different, on that long ago sultry August afternoon. I had just gotten done with a three-year hitch in the Army earlier that year, and was doing some stringer work for the L’Anse Sentinel. The Vietnam War was still going strong, although President Richard Nixon had vowed to remove all of our troops earlier in ...