It's no small accomplishment to have two teams from one school participating in their respective state tournaments at the same time. Both the Freeport High School dance and bowling teams deserve the fanfare that goes along with sustained success.
Members of the boy's bowling team, which advanced to the second day of the state tournament, are perennial state qualifiers, making it in 11 of the last 16 seasons. There are few, if any, programs in any sport in the area that have achieved more consistent success than Freeport High School's bowlers.
Then, there's the dance team. The dancers took last year's 1A state finals appearance and parlayed that into their first ever NIC-10 championship earlier this month. They then persevered and managed to make it to their second straight appearance at state despite moving up a class to 2A. Despite being one of the smallest schools in their class, they managed to find the same type of success.
Asche joins NUIC 1,000-point club
Kaite Asche, a Durand High School senior, just joined Aquin's Zac Cummins, Stockton's Emily Offenheiser and Dakota's Ellie Packer as members of the Northwest Upstate Illini Conference's 1,000 points club.
She dropped her 1,000th point against Orangeville on Tuesday. Asche managed to hit the 1,000 mark in just less than three seasons. She's been playing at the varsity level since she was a sophomore.
Butler trade shows up on Rising Stars roster
Most Bulls fans were lukewarm at best when the team decided to ship off Jimmy Butler in return for Zach LaVine, Kris Dunn and the seventh pick, Lauri Markkanen.
LaVine was the piece that most fans seemed to latch on to for some sort of hope. An injury has prevented him from showing whether that hope was warranted.
Markkanen looks like he has the makings of an offensive superstar, using his 7-foot frame to average 15.4 points per game. He's demonstrated an ability to score both inside and out, shooting about 36 percent from beyond the arc.
Meanwhile, Kris Dunn has recovered from a rough rookie season to join Markkanen in the Rising Stars game. He's averaged 13.7 points per game and has raised his field goal, free throw percentage by four percent, and free throw percentage by 10 percent. Hopefully a recent concussion does not derail what has finally started to look like a promising NBA career.
Derrick Mason: 815-232-0133; derrick.mason@journalstandard.com; @derrickhmason