Sports

Wisconsin Heights’ girls volleyball team has always challenged itself against elite competition in star-studded tournaments. This year has been no different, and last Saturday the Vanguards went to the 17-team Middleton Invite.

The Wisconsin Heights/Barneveld boys soccer team downed Cambridge/Deerfield United, 5-3, on Sept. 17. The Vanguards improved to 3-3 overall and 2-1 in the Capitol Conference. The win puts Heights/Barneveld one game behind conference leaders Lodi and Sugar River.

Christian Patzka shined again. But it wasn’t enough to carry the Wisconsin Heights/Barneveld cross country team. The Vanguards finished fifth out of seven teams at the Mount Horeb Invite last Saturday.

WATERTOWN — Different approach, same results summed up the performance of Sauk Prairie’s boys cross country team at the annual Badger Conference Challenge hosted by Watertown on Sept. 17 The Eagles finished second overall and placed first out of eight teams in the Badger North Conference on the Watertown High School course.

When you’re building a program, not everything comes up roses. Amy Schlimgen and Sauk Prairie’s girls volleyball team discovered that last week. The Eagles dropped an intense, five-set match to Mount Horeb last Thursday. Sauk Prairie then finished in 10th place at the 17-team Middleton Invite last Saturday.

It was Senior Night for Sauk Prairie’s girls tennis team on Sept. 17. And the Eagles celebrated the best way they knew how — with a 7-0 shellacking of visiting Reedsburg. “Overall, I’m proud of the team’s performance,” Eagles coach Heather Slosarek said. “We hope to continue riding this wave.”

Sauk Prairie reached the midpoint of the boys soccer regular season last week hoping to make a run at the Badger North Conference title, then chase postseason greatness. So that made the Eagles’ quadrangular event last Saturday an important barometer on the state of the program according to first-year coach Drew Kornish.

Sweet revenge. Sauk Prairie’s girls tennis team lost just one Northern Badger Conference dual meet a year ago — and that came to DeForest. Last Tuesday, the Eagles got a measure of payback, topping the Norskies, 4-3.

Wisconsin Heights’ girls volleyball team finished in fourth place at the Beaver Dam Invitational last Saturday. “We didn’t play our best volleyball, but there were plenty of shining moments,” Heights coach Kala O’Connell said. The Vanguards opened with a 25-20, 25-15 win over Mayville.

Sauk Prairie girls swimming coach Melani Guentherman knew that visiting DeForest would provide a tough early-season test for her squad. The Norskies did exactly that. Sauk Prairie recorded seven second-place finishes, including all three relays, but fell to visiting DeForest, 110-60, in a Badger North Conference dual on Sept. 9.