December 30, 2020 at 10:56 a.m.
2020 Year In Review: Top local sports stories
Impact of COVID-19 is top local sports story of 2020
2020 Year In Review: Top local sports stories
2020 can best be categorized as a year of extremes. We saw the highest of highs - including a team state championship and the best Rhinelander High School football season in decades. We also saw the lowest of lows and many teams did not even have a season due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
There is plenty to celebrate about 2020, and we will do so later on in this column, but the top local sports story of 2020 has to be the saga that was the COVID-19 pandemic - from the day that sports stopped to the hard-fought battle to get players back on the fields and courts.
That tops what was an incredible list of stories in 2020.
Three other stories - the construction of the Hodag Dome, the Rhinelander High School girls' swim team's WIAA Division 2 state championship and the memorable 8-1 campaign for the RHS football team - would be slam-dunk No. 1 stories in most years. However, as we know, 2020 was not most years. When deciding on this year's No. 1 story, the ultimate determining factor was this - one cannot tell any of the other stories in our top five without mentioning the role the pandemic played.
COVID slowed down some of the hardware needed to assemble the Hodag Dome and, as we documented in a commemorative section distributed via mail this week, may have never began construction if the shutdown due to the pandemic had happened a week or two earlier.
The RHS girls' swim team managed to somehow dodge the virus' effects while other D2 powers decided to forego the 2020 season due to the pandemic, thus creating a window of opportunity for a team state title that may not have otherwise existed. COVID concerns shortened and condensed the WIAA football playoffs, and caused the Hodags to find a last-minute replacement in Week 5 after Lakeland had to pause due to the virus.
Meanwhile, 2020 also saw the retirement of Rhinelander's longest-tenured coach, Bob Heideman, who said the pandemic played a role in his decision to abruptly step down in May after 36 seasons.
All of this doesn't even begin to get into the most profound impact of the virus on sports, not just in Rhinelander but around the state and the world.
Locally, the entire spring sports calendar was eliminated due to the virus, and most of the summer contact period was wiped away as well. Not until Aug. 24 did the School District of Rhinelander Board of Education affirm that the fall sports season would take place in whole, as planned. Even then, facemasks, social distancing and altered game procedures became the new normal. These adjustments have carried over into the winter sports season and will likely stay with us for some or all of 2021 - if not longer.
There are so many tentacles to the COVID-19 story -each of which could have made our top 10 list on its own merits. For the sake of brevity, here is a timeline of tentpole dates as it pertains to local sports and the virus.
March 13 - Gov. Tony Evers closes all K-12 schools in the state until at least April 6, pausing all spring sports practices and games until that time.
April 21 - Following an extension of Gov. Evers Safer at Home order that shuttered schools through June 30, the WIAA Board of Control voted to effectively cancel the spring sports season, offering an opportunity for up to 30 contact days for spring teams beginning July 1.
May 7 - Activities directors from Rhinelander, Antigo, Three Lakes and Lakeland discuss a potential 2 1/2-week summer sports schedule for spring sports, culminating with a week of games July 13-17.
May 9 - The Wisconsin American Legion cancels its 2020 summer baseball season.
May 27 - Rhinelander Babe Ruth baseball officially cancels 2020 season.
June 2 - Hodag Soccer booster club begins holding coordinated conditioning activities for interested boys' and girls' soccer players.
June 18 - WIAA issues summer return-to-play guidance, with activities varying by risk level within communities and risks by sport of close-contact spread of COVID-19.
June 23 - School District of Rhinelander administration nixes proposed summer calendar for spring sports.
July 6 - SDR facilities reopen in a limited capacity for athletes for individualized strength, conditioning and skill work.
July 8 - After months of delay, Hodag BMX club officially cancels 2020 racing season.
July 23 - WIAA delays the start of fall sports season, presenting schools an opportunity to opt out and participate in an alternate fall season in late winter/early spring of 2021.
Aug. 17 - Practice begins for RHS girls' swimming, girls' tennis and cross country.
Aug. 24 - RHS girls' tennis team holds first game since the pandemic began, defeating Marshfield Columbus 6-1. That same evening, the SDR board votes 7-1 to affirm that all RHS fall sports will participate in the traditional fall sports season.
Sept. 7/8 - Practice begins for RHS football, boys' soccer and volleyball.
Sept. 25 - The RHS football team plays its first game, four weeks later than originally scheduled.
Dec. 22 - Northern Edge girls' hockey co-op pauses due to a positive COVID-19 case within the team, becoming the first Rhinelander-affiliated varsity sport to pause activities due to the virus.
Now, for the rest of our top 10 stories.
2. Hodag Dome becomes reality
Take nothing away from the other stories that follow on this list, but none of them stand to leave as profound an impact on this community as the Hodag Dome.
Over the roughly six-month construction period, the barren practice fields behind Rhinelander High School were transformed into an awesome facility that has the potential to benefit the area for decades to come.
While plans and funding for the roughly $8.5-million Hodag Sports Complex were done in previous years, shovel met dirt back in early April. Flash forward to Oct. 17 and the crown jewel of the project, a massive 128,000 square foot air-supported dome, was fully inflated.
The building is expected to become fully operational in early 2021 and has already hosted several RHS practices and competitions.
A gymnastics meet on Dec. 10 was the first sporting event held inside the facility that houses a full turf field for football, soccer and softball, a five-lane running track and four courts than can be used for anything from tennis to pickleball to basketball, volleyball and even gymnastics.
"2020, there has been a lot of disappointments, but this is not one of them," said Rhinelander school board and Hodag Schools Foundation board member Mike Roberts "This is a shining star, for Rhinelander anyway, that everyone will be able to remember."
3 (tie). Girls' swim state championship and football's fantastic season
As far as exploits within the field of competition, two feats stand out above the rest and deserve to be honored, jointly, in our No. 3 spot - frankly because neither team has had this level of success in more than a quarter century.
The fall sports season was dominated by two equally excellent success stories -the state championship run of the Rhinelander High School girls' swim team and the 8-1 campaign for the RHS football team that saw the Hodags end the year with the first two postseason victories in program history.
The Hodag girls' swim team was dominant from the get-go with returning individual state champion Malia Francis and a host of other swimmers back from the squad that took fifth at the 2019 D2 state meet. Rhinelander rolled through the conference, winning all 77 individual races in dual meet competition, and was conference champion in nine of 11 individual events.
The domination continued into sectionals as they won eight individual events and qualified a state-high 15 individual entries for the WIAA D2 meet in Waukesha.
The door was open for the Hodags, as the top three teams from the 2019 state meet opted out of the fall season due to COVID-19, and the Hodags entered the 2020 event projected to win it all. Rhinelander won four races at state - including three of the final four - to come from behind to defeat Shorewood by 27 points for the team's first state title. Malia Francis had a hand in all four wins, and the Hodags eclipsed five school records during the state meet.
Francis repeated as state champion in the 100-yard butterfly and the 100 backstroke, and six of Rhinelander's seven state qualifiers - Malia Francis, Karis Francis, Abi Winnicki, Makenna Winnicki, Noelle St. Pierre and Genna Fugle - played a role in at least one individual state championship on meet day. The seventh qualifier, Lisa Kennedy, reached the podium in two events, and her fourth-place finish in the 100 backstroke helped the Hodags take a sizable lead into the final race of the evening.
The same night the Hodag girls were winning their elusive first state championship, the Hodag football team was doing something it had never done before - win a WIAA postseason game. In typical fashion for the 2020 Hodags, Rhinelander did it in come-from-behind style, on a go-ahead Quinn Lamers touchdown run with 1:59 remaining to cement a 27-20 win over Lakeland.
That was one of six come-from-behind wins for the Hodags, who won eight games in a season for the first time since 1989. 2020 was loaded with those types of feats for the Hodags. It started with a 21-18 double overtime win at Antigo in the Bell Game - Rhinelander's first win in Antigo since 2002 and first successful defense of the Bell Trophy since 2000. In Week 2, the Hodags defeated Mosinee for the first time since joining the GNC, and beat the Indians once more for good measure in the season finale - stopping Michal Dul on a go-ahead two-point conversion attempt with 1:31 remaining to preserve a 27-26 victory.
The only blemish on Rhinelander's record was a 24-7 home loss to Medford in the final week of the regular season that cost the Hodags what would have been their first conference championship since 1989.
5. Heideman retires
In February, longtime Rhinelander High School tennis coach Bob Heideman was looking forward to his induction into the Wisconsin High School Tennis Coaches Association Hall of Fame and potentially chasing his 600th career dual meet victory.
While the former will happen eventually, the latter will likely never happen due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Heideman announced his retirement as head coach of the Hodags in mid-May, after the pandemic wiped out the RHS boys' tennis season and cast a shadow of doubt over the girls' season. Heideman served as head coach of either the RHS boys' tennis team, girls' tennis team or both, consecutively for 36 seasons, amassing 591 career victories, 21 conference championships, 22 subsectional titles, two sectional titles and 51 individual state tournament entries.
Heideman said two factors played a role in his decision - the uncertainties surrounding COVID-19 and the fact that there was an heir apparent ready to receive the baton. Matt Nichols was hired to replace Heideman less than a month later and has been tasked with carrying the program into a new era.
"Even at this point, a difficult decision, because there are a number of athletes, tennis athletes, at Rhinelander High who've got kind of the tennis bug," Heideman said back in May. "It will always be hard to not stay involved with them. That's still there."
Heideman's induction in the WHSTCA Hall of Fame will occur at a later date.
6. Hodag girls' hoops roars to sectionals
The Rhinelander High School girls' basketball team knew it would have a tough act to follow after going 18-6 during the 2018-19 season, winning the program's first conference championship in the process.
Yet the Lady Hodags found a way to do one better in 2019-20.
Rhinelander repeated as conference champions, clinching it with a 55-44 victory over archrival Lakeland Feb. 11. Rhinelander also moved one round deeper into the WIAA tournament, avenging a regional final lost to New London in the 2019 playoffs.
This time around, Rhinelander got the Bulldogs on the Jim Miazga Community Gym floor, rallied from an early 14-point deficit and defeated New London 60-51.
The Hodags lost in the sectional finals to eventual state qualifier Hortonville, but finished the season with a 19-6 record and had GNC co-players of the year in Kenedy Van Zile and Cynthia Beavers. Along the way, Van Zile became the all-time leading scorer in RHS history, regardless of gender, as she finished with 1,670 points in her four-year career.
7. Boys' swim dominates GNC
The 2019-20 boys' swim season was a bit of a precursor of what was to come the following fall for the RHS girls' swim team.
After winning the GNC and sectional titles in 2018-19,the Hodag boys repeated the feat in 2019-20 - doing so in even more dominant fashion.
Rhinelander won the GNC championship, scoring 417 points at the conference meet as it won with a conference record-setting 132-point margin of victory. The total was also the most points scored in a six-team conference meet. (Lakeland scored 431 points in a five-team meet in 2013).
The Hodags continued their dominance the following week at sectionals, finishing on the podium in all but one event as it won the WIAA Division 2 sectional title for a second year in a row. In the process, Rhinelander qualified nine entries - including all three of its relays - for the WIAA state meet.
8. Hodag hockey's Cinderella run
The first year of a two-division WIAA boys' hockey tournament was a memorable one for the Hodag boys' hockey team, which finished an eyelash away from the sectional finals despite coming into the tournament as the seventh seed in their eight-team regional.
The Hodags began their run with a 3-1 upset win over Lakeland in the regional finals before falling to third-seeded Mosinee in overtime, 3-2, in the sectional semifinal round.
Rhinelander rallied from down 2-0 in the third at Mosinee to force the extra session, but AJ Buenning won it for the Indians with 57.1 seconds left in the first extra session.
2020 turned out to be a year of upsets for the Hodags who, on Dec. 3, defeated Northland Pines for the first time since 1991.
9. RHS boys' soccer returns to the top
Following a couple of down years, the Rhinelander High School boys' soccer team returned to the top of the Great Northern Conference in 2020.
The Hodags, who won three games in 2019 under first-year head coach Nathan Bates, matched that win total in the first week of a condensed season in 2020. Rhinelander went from 3-8-6 to 12-3-0 in a matter of a year, winning the GNC in the process.
It was the Hodags' first GNC title since 2017, also the Hodags' first trip to sectionals since that time.
A 1-0 win over Medford Sept. 17 proved key as Rhinelander fended off the rest of the conference.
A pair of one-goal wins over Mosinee in October allowed Rhinelander to clinch the title with one game remaining.
Medford got the last laugh, however, beating Rhinelander 2-0 in the sectional finals as the Raiders made it all the way to the state tournament before losing to eventual D2 state champ Two Rivers/Roncalli.
10. Bantams take third in home state tournament
The last sporting event held in Rhinelander before the COVID-19 shutdown was a memorable one, as the Rhinelander Ice Association's Bantam hockey team hosted the Wisconsin Amateur Hockey Association Class 3A state championship and finished third overall.
The Hodags rallied from down 3-0 after one period in the third-place game against Lakeland, tied it on a Finn Tulowitzky goal with 1.6 seconds remaining in regulation and then won it on a Joey Belanger score 24 seconds into the extra session.
Earlier, the Hodags opened with a 10-2 win over Sauk Prairie before falling to Amery, 8-5.
It marked the sixth time in the eight years that the Rhinelander Ice Association was selected to host a WAHA state tournament.
Jeremy Mayo may be reached at [email protected].
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