November 2015

Once again, they were the beasts of the Big Eight Conference and a force across the state.

So it was certainly no surprise that Middleton’s boys volleyball team was well represented on the all-conference team.

Senior outside hitter Kevin McMahon was named first-team all-conference, was the league’s Player of the Year and received honorable-mention all-state honors.

Senior middle blocker Blake Sprecher was a first-team all-conference selection, received high honorable-mention all-state honors and was voted Middleton’s MVP.

Sophomore libero Thomas Robson was named first-team all-conference. Senior middle hitter Pace Balster and sophomore setter Andrew Lepage were named second-team all-Big Eight, while junior middle blocker Cole Spitler was named honorable-mention all-conference.

Middleton’s Ben White was also named the Big Eight’s Coach of the Year.

What they lack in stature they more than make up for with speed, skill and stamina.

Middleton’s girls basketball team might be one of the smallest around this season. The Cardinals could also be one of the best.

“We could play five guards at times,” said Middleton coach Jeff Kind, whose team opened the season Tuesday against Stoughton. “And that’s fine. The goals still won’t change.”

With good reason.

Kind has built one of the state’s top programs and has taken the Cardinals to state eight times since 2001 and nine times overall. Last year, Middleton reached the state semifinals before losing in overtime to eventual champion DSHA.

The Cardinals return several key cogs from last year’s team that went 22-5 overall and 15-3 in the Big Eight Conference. But most of Middleton’s returnees are guards, and the roster lacks great size, meaning Kind & Co. will play a lot of small ball.

MILWAUKEE — Deep down, they knew the odds were long.

Then again, they weren’t exactly favorites most of the season.

Late Friday afternoon, though, the clock struck 12 for a Middleton boys volleyball team that had bucked the probabilities all year long.

New Berlin United and its heavy arsenal was on full display in a 25-22, 25-12, 25-12 win over Middleton in a WIAA state quarterfinal game held at Wisconsin Lutheran College.

United, the No. 4 seed in the tournament, lost the following day to Kettle Moraine in the state semifinals. Middleton finished the year 21-11 overall.

“One match doesn’t define a season,” Middleton coach Ben White said. “And that’s what I told the guys. We can’t let one match define us.

“Only eight teams made it here and no one can ever take that experience away from our guys. They definitely overachieved.”

No one would argue that.

A blood-caked shoe sits in a pool of viscous crimson, resting at the foot of an old metal locker. Several undead men in baseball uniforms mill about, waiting for their scenes. A few conspicuously alive people gather around a clipboard, reviewing their plans for the night of filming as darkness falls upon the Bowling Green athletic fields in the City of Middleton.

Filming on “Field of Screams,” a giddily campy horror short film, was well underway, and it transformed a local athletic complex into the stuff of midnight movie madness.  The premise is simple: “A woman tries to sell the baseball field she inherited from her parents at a young age, but the team isn’t ready to let it, or her, go…”

 “The idea came from the location,” explains director Natalie Pohorski. “While I grew up in Middleton, I had never been to Bowling Green fields so when I showed up to a friend’s softball game last fall, I couldn’t believe this amazing filming location was right in my backyard.”