High School Track and Field

The Steve Roth Relays commenced yesterday in Washington with most of Southeast Iowa in attendance, here’s some highlights from the meet.

Kaiden Amigon of Columbus took first place in Class C of the 100 meter dash with a time of 11.25 seconds. Landon Seibert of Danville grabbed third with a time of 11.89 seconds. 

Landry Haberichter of West Burlington took the gold in Class B of the 100 meter dash with a time of 11.04 seconds. 

Staying in Class B, Kyler Crow of Mediapolis took first with a time of 24.10 seconds in the 200 meter dash. 

Ayden Doyle of Danville finished in first place in the 200 meter dash followed by Amigon and Clayton Miller of WACO with the top time being 22.83 seconds. 

Mediapolis finished a few ticks behind the leader in the 4×100 meter relay to grab second place for Class B.

In Class B, Noah Schmidgall and Lathen Keller of Mediapolis finished in fourth and fifth place, respectively, in the 400 meter dash, while West Burlington’s Caden Schwenker took eighth place. 

For Class C, Sheaden Adams of Winfield-Mt. Union took gold in the 400 meter dash with a time of 55.24 seconds. Kessler Whaley of Danville took second place. 

Sticking with Class C, Kohlby Newsom grabbed another first place finish for Winfield-Mt. Union with a time of 2 minutes and 6 seconds in the 800 meter run. 

In Class A, Jude Dykstra of Mt. Pleasant raced to a time of 2 minutes and 9 seconds in the 800 meter run, which was good enough for sixth place. 

Mediapolis populated the top spots in the 800 meter run with Logan Rosas capturing first place with a time of 2 minutes and Owen Schmidgall nabbing second place with a time of 2 minutes and 6 seconds. This helped get them a first place finish in the 4×800 meter relay.

Solomon Zaugg of Mediapolis won the gold in the 1600 meter run with a time of 4 minutes and 30 seconds. In Class C, Carter Fesler of Danville took first place with a time of 4 minutes and 50 seconds. 

In Class B, Adam Sobczak finished in first in the 400 meter hurdles with a sub-minute time (59.79 seconds). Gabriel Hemsworth of Winfield-Mt. Union took first place in Class C with a time of 1 minute. 

In Class B, Noah Schmidgall and Nathan Schmidgall finished in first and second place, respectively, in the long jump with a leap of 18 feet and 6.5 inches being the best jump. 

In Class C, Amigon finished with a jump of 19 feet and 2 inches, which clinched first place. 

Avin Truong of Mt. Pleasant leapt to a second place finish in the Class A long jump with a distance of 20 feet and 6 inches. 

Mason Watkins of West Burlington grabbed second place in the high jump with a leap of 5 feet and 10 inches. 

Jake Edwards of Winfield-Mt. Union  jumped 5 feet 10 inches in the Class C high jump for a first place finish. Louden Huisenga of WACO took second with a jump of 5 feet and 8 inches. 

Harmon Ensminger of Mt. Pleasant tossed the shot put 44 feet and 1 inch for fifth place in the Class A shot put. 

Lastly, in Class C, Russel Coil of Columbus swept the throwing events with a toss of 141 feet and 1 inch in the discus and 48 feet and 1 inch in the shot put. 

The Mt. Pleasant girls team will compete at a meet in West Burlington on March 26th.

The WACO girls’ team will run on March 26th at West Burlington.

The New London and Central Lee boys’ teams will participate in a meet on March 25th at West Burlington.

The Mediapolis, Danville, Winfield-Mt. Union, and New London girls’ teams will compete in a relay on March 26th at West Burlington.

High School Soccer

The WACO boys’ team will open the season on March 28th against Fairfield on the road at 5 pm.

The Columbus/Winfield-Mt. Union boys’ and girls’ teams will take on West Liberty on March 25th at home with the girls’ game scheduled first at 5 pm. 

The Mt. Pleasant girls’ will host Mediapolis on March 26th to start their season at 4:30 pm, while the boys’ will travel to Danville to play at 5 pm on the same day. 

The Danville girls’ team will face off against Assumption on March 25th on the road at 5 pm.

The Mediapolis boys’ team will take on Burlington on March 26th on the road at 5 pm.

College Signing

Another Panther will be donning the red and black next year as Reece Coffman signed his Letter of Intent to golf at Southeastern Community College (SCC) next year. Fellow Panther, Nate Dismang, announced his decision to golf at SCC back in December.

Coffman had the third best 18-hole average last season at a clip of 94.17 with the second-best 18-hole low of 84. The senior talked about how college athletics was always a desire after figuring out he was superb golfer, and he will get his chance at SCC,

“SCC was like my first choice because I wanted to, like, get Community College out of the way because I just want to get used to like the college feel and it’s closer to home so I can get some of my general education stuff out of the way before I move on to a bigger college.”

The Panthers are looking to improve upon their 4th place finish at the Southeast Conference meet from last season, but the senior is putting no added pressure on himself,

“Having fun is a good one, but obviously since next year I got to do really well, this year I’m thinking hopefully I can shoot low and play great golf this year. Have a great mindset going into college.”

Coffman plans on studying to become an Elementary School Teacher.

The Panthers hit the greens on Monday, April 1st, in their first conference meet at the Fairfield Golf and Country Club.

Southeastern Community College

SCC baseball will host Northeast Community College tomorrow in a doubleheader. 

The SCC softball team will travel to take on Indian Hills Community College tomorrow in a doubleheader. 

College Basketball

The Iowa women’s team will be the #1-seed in the Albany Regional for the National Championship bracket, which means they will host the first two rounds. The Hawkeys will take on either Holy Cross tomorrow, March 23rd, at 2 pm.

The Iowa State women’s team will be making their 5th consecutive trip to the NCAA tournament as the Cyclones earned the #7-seed. They will face off against Maryland tonight at 6:30 pm. 

The #2-seed Iowa State men’s team ran away with their first-round contest against #15 South Dakota last night 82-65. Tamin Lipsey finished the contest with 17 points, sevens assists, and two steals. The Cyclones will take on #7 Washington State tomorrow at 5:10 pm. The Cougars defeated Drake yesterday 66-61.

The Iowa men’s team will face off against the #2-seed Utah on Sunday, March 24th, at 8 pm for the second round of the NIT. 

March Madness

The KILJ bracket challenge, sponsored by The Press Box and Wiley’s Interior Furnishings and Design, is officially underway with over 30 brackets submitted with the top three set to receive prizes.

Standings will be updated at the conclusion of each round.

This Day in Sports History

1969 – 31st NCAA Men’s Basketball Championship: UCLA beats Purdue 92-72 for a Bruins’ 3-peat; center Kareem Abdul-Jabbar is the tournament’s Most Outstanding Player for the third consecutive year.

1986 – HBO launches boxing’s heavyweight-title-unification-tournament.

1989 – Pete Rozelle announces his retirement as the NFL commissioner after 29 years.

Mount Pleasant, IA- Another Panther will be donning the red and black next year as Reece Coffman signed his Letter of Intent to golf at Southeastern Community College (SCC) next year. Fellow Panther, Nate Dismang, announced his decision to golf at SCC back in December.

Coffman had the third best 18-hole average last season at a clip of 94.17 with the second-best 18-hole low of 84. The senior talked about how college athletics was always a desire after figuring out he was superb golfer, and he will get his chance at SCC,

“SCC was like my first choice because I wanted to, like, get Community College out of the way because I just want to get used to like the college feel and it’s closer to home so I can get some of my general education stuff out of the way before I move on to a bigger college.”

Coffman heads into the season as one of the leaders and he credits head coach Robert Zeglen with his development,

“I mean, Rob has been a great coach. He was there for Young Guns and it’s nice having someone who you’ve known for a while to help coach because then you’re very familiar with how he teaches you and everything. He’s a good guy. He always helps with what you need and it helps you move on to be a better golfer and a greater golfer.”

The Panthers are looking to improve upon their 4^th place finish at the Southeast Conference meet from last season, but the senior is putting no added pressure on himself,

“Having fun is a good one, but obviously since next year I got to do really well, this year I’m thinking hopefully I can shoot low and play great golf this year. Have a great mindset going into college.”

Coffman plans on studying to become an Elementary School Teacher.

The Panthers hit the greens on Monday, April 1^st, in their first conference meet at the Fairfield Golf and Country Club.

Mount Pleasant, IA- The men’s March Madness is set to start at 11:15 am this morning with #8 Mississippi State facing off against #9 Michigan State to get the tournament rolling.

That game will also signify the official start of KILJ’s Bracket Challenge sponsored by The Press Box and Wiley’s Interior Furnishings and Design. Moreover, that game will also end many of hopes at a perfect bracket, which presented the idea to go through all 34 brackets and peruse the data.

So, without further ado here’s the stats no one asked for but still seemed interesting.

March Madness is known for its unpredictability and Cinderella stories, but most of the time the higher seeds win their matchups and that was apparent amongst our bracket submissions with an average of only 6.5 upsets in the first round or an upset in just 20% of the games. Last year saw 7 first round upsets.

Despite #15 Princeton and #16 FDU winning their first-round matchups last year, only two brackets picked a #15-seed to win, Long Beach and Western Kentucky, with both teams making it to the Sweet 16.

To stay on the theme of upsets, the most common upsets occurred in the #7 versus #10 matchup. #10 Drake was picked over #7 Washington State in 21 of the 34 brackets or 62% of the time and #10 Nevada was selected 20 times or 59% of the time against #7 Dayton.

The #11 seeds Oregon and New Mexico were each picked 14 times to pull off the upset with Grand Canyon advancing 12 times, James Madison 11 times, and NC State 10 times.

No one picked #16-seed to upset a #1-seed.

One bracket picked 14 first-round upsets, while another selected zero upsets. Six brackets had nine upsets, which was the mode.

Now, let’s take a look at the Final Four teams. UConn was a Final Four team in 91% of brackets with Houston a distant second with 62% of brackets putting them in the Final Four. Purdue was selected in 19 of the 34 brackets followed by Arizona, North Carolina, and Kentucky.

Iowa State did not get the benefit of the home-state advantage, being selected just seven times to advance to the Final Four. Now, there were two brackets that predicted two separate historical moments for March Madness.

One bracket had #11 NC State advance all the way to the Final Four, which would tie the record for the lowest seed to advance to the Final Four as 2021 UCLA being the last team to do so.

The other historical moment properly leads us to the most common championship matchups selected. Unsurprisingly, UConn, Houston, and Purdue dominated the matchups with UConn and Purdue squaring off for the championship in 8 of the brackets, while UConn and Houston faced off 7 times.

The next closest was Arizona versus Purdue and UConn taking on Marquette as these matchups were selected three times. UConn was selected to advance from the Final Four to the championship game in 20 of the 31 brackets.

Furthermore, UConn was the National Champion for 16 brackets or 47% of the total field. Purdue was next with five brackets picking them to be champions. Houston was picked a mere four times, while Iowa State, Kentucky, and Arizona was selected twice each.

North Carolina and Kansas were each picked once to win the championship. Leading us to a predicted historical moment, one bracket selected #10 Drake to upset everyone and win the National Championship.

This would not only be the Bulldogs’ second Final Four appearance but their first National Championship in program history. Furthermore, the Bulldogs would also be the lowest seed to ever make the championship game let alone win. That honor goes to four #8-seeds as Villanova in 1985 was the only #8-seed to win the big game.

So, those are the percentages and stats heading into KILJ’s Bracket Challenge and to leave you with one final stat: the odds of filling out a perfect bracket are 1 in 9.2 quintillion to round down.