Baranek: No runaways in race for softball glory

Apr 26, 2012

OK, so we’re heading to the three-quarter pole in the 2012 softball season. What can I tell you with complete confidence about what lies ahead? Well ... we’re going to have a banquet at Jenny’s Steakhouse. What I’m going to be saying at that banquet about the teams that excelled …

Baranek: Telling tales — and tails — out of school

Apr 26, 2012

And now for another installment of our annual strange, often funny — and this year chilling — diamond tales ... More than any other professional …

Bucci keeps sharp eye on ‘big picture’

Apr 26, 2012

Hillcrest’s softball team scored three runs in the final inning of Wednesday’s 2012 opener. No offense to St. Francis de Sales, but it would have …

Girls hoops season full of lasting impressions

Apr 26, 2012

Before we turn the clocks ahead one hour Saturday, let’s rewind back a few months and take one last look back at some girls basketball …

Hillcrest doesn’t want a Thornton-esque three-peat

Apr 26, 2012

Excuse me if I’m experiencing a little deja vu this weekend, with Hillcrest meeting Montini for the third year in a row at Redbird Arena. …

Being there just isn’t that tough

Apr 26, 2012

Tony Baranek: March Madness still is a ways off, but at Morgan Park the state playoffs already have begun.

Another year of memories in the books

Apr 26, 2012

Tony Baranek: Let’s ring out 2011 with some highlights from the notebook of a well-traveled scribe ...

Baranek: IHSA girls basketball record book dotted with Southlanders

Apr 26, 2012

Some people probably don’t want to hear this, but our girls basketball coaches here in the Southland actually are pretty good when it comes to stepping on the brakes and not really “running it up” on opponents. 

Mike Valente hoping to make some noise at Peace

Apr 26, 2012

Tony Baranek: One of the reasons we send out preseason surveys to coaches in various sports is to get their perspective on how they think their teams are going to be. We ask for assessments and projections. Occasionally, coaches suggest story ideas. 

Marist’s Ivkovic makes journey from ‘B’ to varsity

Apr 26, 2012

TONY BARANEK: As a freshman, Kirsten Ivkovic was a member of Marist’s “B” volleyball team. Many from that squad didn’t play in their sophomore season, but Ivkovic has blossomed into one of the area’s leading blockers. She’s a leader for the RedHawks, who are competing this weekend in the Class 4A state finals.

Tony Baranek: Julia Hudson never coached by the numbers

Apr 26, 2012

So how is longtime Lockport girls volleyball coach Julia Hudson handling this retirement thing? With humor. For instance, she wanted to make one thing perfectly clear Wednesday.

Bremen’s Smith doesn’t let words get in his way

Apr 26, 2012

If words came to Bremen’s David Smith as easily as yards, he probably wouldn’t be the subject of our forum today. Much already has been …

Baranek: Playoff picks you can put on a (card)board

Apr 26, 2012

TONY BARANEK: I tried to tell them, but they didn’t believe me. They just didn’t believe me. It stated right here in this weekly space a year ago Marist was going to beat Mother McAuley in volleyball for the first time in postseason history. Sure enough, it happened.

Life brings happy return to Bremen for Flaherty

Apr 26, 2012

TONY BARANEK: This is a story about coaching and friendship. Family and devotion. Loyalty and happy endings. The reason for writing it is that Brian Flaherty is back as the head boys basketball coach at Bremen High School. 

Her confidence shaken, this Mac battles back

Apr 26, 2012

Baranek: After two years as a starter on the lower levels, Mother McAuley’s Katie Flynn found herself on the outside looking in as a junior in 2010 when she was cut on the final day of varsity tryouts. Undaunted, she kept playing volleyball at the club level, and in 2011 earned a spot on McAuley’s roster.

No room in softball for this squeeze play

Apr 26, 2012

TONY BARANEK: What?!?! That, in a word, sums up the face of Andrew pitcher Brooke Hofer in the photo that accompanies this column. Hofer is looking in at the home-plate umpire during Saturday’s Class 4A Lockport Sectional title game against Sandburg. She’s incredulous that a pitch she thought should have been called a strike was instead called a ball.