The Opening Drive: Week 7

Welcome to “The Opening Drive!”  Here we take a look at the sport stories making news in the Grant County area from this past week…let’s get started.

In Cross Country, three county teams will be participating in semi-state meets tomorrow.  The Oak Hill Boys team along with the Eastbrook Panthers Boys and Girls Cross Country teams will run for a chance to make it to the state finals.  The Oak Hill boys will run at New Prairie High School starting at 10:30 am.  This is the seventh trip to the semi-state round in the past eight seasons for the Golden Eagles and Coach Paige Brunner. On the boys’ side for the Panthers, sophomore Josh Neideck won the race for both the sectional and regional meets.  The two Eastbrook teams will run at New Haven High School starting at 1 pm tomorrow. 

In men’s college soccer, the Taylor Trojans are celebrating their first Mid-Central College Conference Regular Season Championship since 1997.  With Wednesday’s two to nothing win over Indiana Wesleyan and Bethel’s loss to Goshen on the same night, the Trojans claimed the outright championship.  Taylor improved to 7-0-1 in conference play this year and 15-1-1 overall.  The win was also the first for Taylor over Indiana Wesleyan since 2001. Taylor’s next game is later this afternoon at 4 pm against Goshen in Upland. 

In high school football, the 39^th annual Indiana High School Athletic Association State Tournament begins tonight.  All 5 Grant County teams will be in action in the first round of sectional play.  The Central Indiana Conference Champion Madison-Grant Argyles will host Oak Hill in the only intra-county match-up.  Yorktown will be at Eastbrook High School tonight to take on the 6-3 Eastbrook Panthers.  Maconaquah will host the 7-2 and reeling Mississinewa Indians and finally, the Marion Giants are at Jay County.  All games have a 7 pm start except the Marion/Jay County game which starts at 7:30 pm.

That concludes our Opening Drive segment.  Make sure you listen for the Fortress Sports Update airing throughout the week that gives you a glimpse into the week’s upcoming high school sporting events.  For WIWU sports, I’m Tim Decker.