August 2015

Tanner Meinholz spent the early part of the season on the bench, biding his time and waiting to play for defending Home Talent League champion Ashton.

On Sunday, Meinholz delivered a clutch hit when Ashton needed him the most.

Meinholz lined a two-out, two-run single to center field in the top of the ninth inning to help rally Ashton to a 5-3 victory over host Middleton in an HTL Northern Sectional championship game at Sorrenson-Bakken Field.

The victory sent Ashton (13-6) into in the league’s Final Four round-robin championship series next Sunday at Monona.

“Tanner was a guy who didn’t play in the beginning of the year, but we had some guys getting hurt and some who couldn’t play anymore,” said Shane Adler, who started in center field but pitched the final four innings to pick up the victory for Ashton. “Tanner stepped up and has been doing a heck of a job in the middle of our lineup. It’s awesome to see him have success.”

The wind was downright brutal, gusting up to 30 miles an hour at times.

The temperatures made it feel more like October than August.

But none of that stopped Middleton’s girls golf team on Monday.

The Cardinals bested a star-studded field and won the 17-team Waunakee Invite held at The Meadows of Sixmile Creek.

Middleton carded a 344-team score and edged Verona by three shots for the team title. Top-ranked Hartland Arrowhead was third at 351, while Monona Grove (385) and Oregon (388) rounded out the top five.

“Scores were definitely higher today because of the brutal conditions out there,” Middleton coach Becky Halverson said. “I told the girls on the way there that it was going to be a mental game playing in that wind. The team that was the most mentally tough was going to come out on top and I was pleasantly surprised that it was us.”

Female artists are just better than males ones. That’s the way Tom Forrester feels, and that’s the principle on which his independent radio station was founded nearly a decade ago.

“I’ve always appreciated the girl artists,” he says, sitting in the headquarters of Girls Rock Radio, which also happens to be a downstairs room in his Middleton home. “They sound a lot better than their boy counterparts.”

For a small Internet station – in this case one that specializes in the women of rock, pop and alternative music - to stay on the air for nine years is no small feat, especially in what Forrester calls “the harsh, here-today, gone-tomorrow climate facing Internet radio stations today.”

But while it hasn’t always been easy, Forrester says he’s glad he opted out of his former profession and decided to pursue his dream.

Twelve months ago, they were ignored, overlooked, and many believed disrespected.

Today, it’s exactly the opposite.

Middleton’s football team — which begins the year Friday at Janesville Parker at 7 p.m. — has been picked to win the Big Eight Conference. And Cardinals head coach Tim Simon, who’s beginning his 12^th season, is just fine being the hunted instead of the hunter.

“Things are a little bit different when you’re the team everyone is gunning for,” said Simon, who led the 2014 Cardinals to the Big Eight Conference championship. “But our kids are aware of the tradition here, what it takes to be successful.”

Middleton has certainly been successful during Simon’s tenure.

The Cardinals have reached the postseason each of Simon’s 11 seasons. In all, Middleton has reached the playoffs 19 straight years, which is tied for the longest streak in Division 1.