Dippel reflects on time with Badgers

Daily News (West Bend, Wis.)
Published: Dec. 3, 2013

By NICHOLAS DETTMANN

Daily News Sports Editor

MADISON — Not knowing what to expect or what he was capable of achieving, Hartford Union graduate Tyler Dippel set out to work hard and do something special at the University of Wisconsin.

In return, he got memories that will be hard to forget and a new set of brothers he couldn’t imagine not having in his life, especially with what he’s been through the last month.

“It’s a place I’ll never forget,” Dippel said. “It’ll be very special to me for the rest of my life.”

All that hit him in the face like an ice-cold wind gust Saturday during the Wisconsin Badgers’ final game of the regular season against Penn State. It was Senior Day, a day the program honored and thanked 26 seniors for their commitment to the legacy of Wisconsin football.

Moments before the game, head coach Gary Andersen addressed the team in the tunnel just a few feet from the entry way onto the field at Camp Randall Stadium. He looked at the seniors, specifically, and said to them, “This is never going to happen again,” referring to them running out of the tunnel and onto the field at Camp Randall Stadium.

Each senior was introduced individually.

When it was Dippel’s turn, he got butterflies.

“Wow,” he said when he saw the sea of red once out of the darkness of the tunnel and into the sunlight. “I was just taking it in, every little detail.”

At the end of the tunnel was Andersen. Each player then got a necklace of flowers, jogged onto the field between two lines of the UW Marching Band and the underclassmen of the Badgers’ football team. For the previous four years, it was Dippel in that line.

“There was a lot of emotions going on,” Dippel said, adding, “I love these guys to death.”

Dippel got a nice ovation from the crowd, as did quarterback Curt Phillips. The loudest ovations came for wide receiver Jared Abbrederis, running back James White and linebacker Chris Borland.

Each player fought back tears, but they couldn’t hide their emotion. With the help of the big-screen scoreboard behind the north end zone, it wasn’t hard to see what the moment meant to each player.

“Emotions are things that are hard to control sometimes,” Dippel said. “It just hits you hard.”

Waiting for him on the field was his father, Ken.

Tyler Dippel was also voted as one of the four captains for the game, along with Abbrederis, Pat Muldoon and Jacob Pedersen.

To share the moment was his father was special for Dippel, especially after the last month or so for the family. Tyler Dippel left the Badgers before the Nov. 2 game at Iowa to attend to a family matter in California.

Dippel wouldn’t disclose the nature of the family emergency and UW officials remain silent on the issue. It was serious enough, however, to get a teammate to wonder how he could help.

Muldoon, one of the other seniors for the Badgers, is Dippel’s roommate on the road and when the team stays in a hotel the Friday night before a home game. This semester, the two didn’t have many classes so they often met up to have breakfast and just hang out. They formed a bond as tight as brothers.

When the word spread throughout the Badgers’ locker room about Dippel’s situation, Muldoon stepped forward. He had to do something. He asked Andersen if he could go out to California to be with the Dippel family and offer any kind of support he could give them, no matter how big or how small.

“When I went out there, I know it meant a lot,” Muldoon said.

Once back with the team, Dippel was an inspiration.

“He’s a leader on the team,” Muldoon said.

Dippel returned in time for the Badgers’ next game, a home game against BYU. On a whim, Dippel was surged to the front of the group, just seconds before the team took the field. Dippel led the team onto the field for the game, a high honor for any player as it is often the coach that leads a team onto the field.

This situation was different.

“When I was out there (in California), it got pretty emotional for me, too,” Muldoon said. “It’s always hard seeing someone you love go through a hard time. You kind of feel for them. I was glad I could be there. I was glad I could help him.”

Once buried in college recruitment letters, Dippel learned this year he made the right choice.

“There’s no words to describe how much they helped me,” he said. “It’s incredible. I never expected something like that. I couldn’t have done it without them.”

Senior transforms her game after sophomore season

Daily News (West Bend, Wis.)
Published: Nov. 30, 2013

By NICHOLAS DETTMANN

Daily News Sports Editor

Natalie Geidel had one plan. Her volleyball coach at West Bend East, Colleen Hasse, had a different plan.

Going into her junior season, Geidel, an outside hitter, was ready to make an impact on a team buzzing with talent and potential.

“I was really comfortable hitting at the outside position,” Geidel said.

Then, leading up to the start of the 2011 season, Hasse pulled her budding star aside and told her she was going to take her out of her comfort zone.

“From the moment I knew Natalie was coming in as a freshman, I had a plan for her,” Hasse said. “My long-term goal was to see her as a middle (hitter).

“For the first few years (of varsity), I had to get her used to the higher intensity.”

The revelation by the coach to Geidel didn’t sit well at first.

“I was kind of mad,” Geidel said. “When she told me I was going to the middle, I wasn’t looking forward to it.”

She even asked and begged her coach: Is there another option?

“I was kind of stuck there,” Geidel said.

The move paid off for East’s volleyball team and allowed Geidel to take her game to another level.

Geidel was voted the 2013 Daily News All-Area Girls Volleyball Player of the Year by area coaches and the Daily News sports staff.

“I’m psyched,” she said. “It’s a huge honor because of all the work I’ve put into the program for four years and the dedication to the team. It paid off.”

This season, Geidel emerged as one of the stars on a team that won 40 matches and boasted nine seniors, including six returning starters.

She had 316 kills this season, with a 52.6 kill percentage. She averaged 2.6 kills per game and had 71 blocks.

Geidel was also named the Wisconsin Little Ten Conference Player of the Year this offseason and second-team All-State by the state coaches association.

As a junior, Geidel was honorable mention All-State in her first year as a middle.

“I was really surprised when I found out I got All-state; my jaw almost dropped,” she said of her junior year nod. “I think that boosted my confidence to a whole new level.”

She played at a new level this season.

“She had the drive,” Hasse said about why she believed Geidel was best suited to be a middle. “(Middle hitters) have to have the personality and the never-die attitude and can’t get frustrated.”

“That speaks to her as an athlete,” Hasse added. “She’s got a lot of goals. When she sets her mind to it, she really accomplishes a lot of it. It didn’t surprise me she was able to be effective.”

Geidel and Hasse had to work through some frustration early in Geidel’s junior season.

For about three or four years, Geidel has been battling asthma. She was able to work through it on the volleyball court as a freshman and sophomore. Being an outside hitter, that player has an area it has to cover. As a middle, a player must be mobile, able to go from left to right or vice versa quickly, covering a lot more ground.

For Geidel, going through those drills at practice was exhausting.

“At first, it was very, very hard,” Geidel said. “We’d do a couple drills and I would be so out of breath.”

It was a tough spot for Geidel and Hasse. As a three-sport athlete, also competing in basketball and softball, Geidel didn’t want to quit out of the fear of letting her teammates down. Nor did she want them to think she was getting special treatment.

As for Hasse, she didn’t want anything to happen to Geidel, while still trying to groom Geidel into the player she believed she could be.

“You always have to look at the health of the athletes,” Hasse said. “It was really getting to know what she could handle. I will push them (in practice), but she had to tell me when it was too much.

“It took me getting to know her and understand the kind of individual she was.”

Both weren’t ready to give up, though.

Geidel’s physical stamina eventually came around and got to a point where she could compete at a high level.

Then the fun part: playing the position against people other than teammates.

“I really had to change to my mindset,” Geidel said. “It was something I had to work on.”

“The middle is definitely the most difficult position in the front row,” Hasse said. “She took it in stride. She watched and she listened.”

Geidel was also a bit undersized for the position, often going up against girls who were either taller or had longer arms than she did.

“It was a huge adjustment,” Geidel said. “I really had to adjust my shot.”

“It’s a faster game,” Hasse said. “You’re blocking the whole net.”

As she got used to the position, she developed into a more well-rounded player, which made her an appealing draw for college coaches. Before last season, she signed a National Letter of Intent to play volleyball at Viterbo University in La Crosse.

Hasse didn’t want Geidel to look to the other side of the net and be intimidated.

“I wanted her to be the one that people would say Natalie’s the one that’s good,” Hasse said.

Duo shines in first year together on the hard court

Daily News (West Bend, Wis.)

Published: Nov. 29, 2013

By NICHOLAS DETTMANN

Daily News Sports Editor

West Bend East’s Elizabeth Bensen had to make a choice: gripe and moan about the change or take it in stride and return it with a firm volley down the line.

Initially, it wasn’t that simple.

As a freshman, Bensen played No. 2 singles for the Suns and qualified for the sectional. Before this season came a collection of freshmen with a bunch of accolades and talent, led by Lexi Keberle and Melina Schaetz.

Like it is for any student-athlete, admitting there was someone better wasn’t easy for Bensen. However, she knew it was the best thing for the team and that’s why coach Laura Vraney had to find a spot for Bensen.

Vraney moved Bensen to No. 1 doubles and partnered her with junior Hailee Dassow. It was a difficult transition for Bensen because of the drastic differences in the style of play usually used for singles and doubles play.

For Bensen, she wouldn’t play many rallies at the net. That’s almost required in doubles.

“It was kind of a big change,” Bensen said.

“It’s tougher than people think,” Vraney said about moving from singles to doubles. “The points are so much shorter, the strategy is so much different. Your whole style of play changes.”

Bensen at least had someone to learn from who had been down a similar path a year earlier.

Dassow moved to doubles after playing No. 4 singles as a freshman.

“It was a pretty big adjustment going from four singles to one doubles,” Dassow said. “You just learn as you go and get better with every match. I think communication is the key to be a very good doubles team.”

Dassow and Bensen developed into a good doubles team, winning the inaugural Daily News Girls Tennis Doubles Team of the Year honor.

“It was really fun,” Bensen said of the season. “It was really different because I had played singles. Overall I had a fun season.”

This season, the duo formed an alliance as tight as sisters en route to a berth in the WIAA individual state tournament where they won their openinground match over the team that beat them in the sectional.

“It was really exciting,” Bensen said. “Going to state is awesome, but winning your first match is really awesome, especially after losing to them in the sectional.”

To Vraney, it seemed the duo meshed right away.

To start the season, Bensen and Dassow battled through a tightly contested match against Sheboygan South and won the match.

“I remember their first match quite well,” Vraney recalled. “It was against Sheboygan South. It was really close. They were so happy they won. They were excited to be on the court together. After they won their first match, they realized they can win.”

Bensen said, “Since we won it, it gave us confidence the rest of the season. I think it would’ve been different if we had lost that match.”

The turning point of the season may have come during the Washington County Invitational at about the halfway point. The pair took second.

“We realized we can play with the upper-level teams,” Bensen said.

With Dassow having gone through a similar transition, she stepped up her game not only on the court, but with her leadership as well.

“I taught her some of the strategies,” Dassow said. “She was very open about it and caught on really quick.” Vraney added, “Hailee is a really good leader on the court. She keeps Lizzy calm. She’s a solid player. She doesn’t really have any weaknesses in her game. Hailee was a leader for our whole team. Her leadership was important.”

It took some time for Bensen to warm up to the idea of moving from singles to doubles. With the way the WIAA sets up its state tournament, typically the No. 1 and No. 2 singles and No. 1 doubles teams advance to state. Sometimes a No. 2 doubles team can make it to state via special qualifier. Flights after that almost have no chance to qualify for state.

Bensen had thought she may not get a chance to go to state because of the influx of incoming freshmen who she knew were quite good.

She was ready to take one for the team, though.

“Lizzy she’s a fighter,” Vraney said. “She’s positive. She really wants to learn. She asks questions. She just wants to get better.” “Lizzy’s style of play had to shift,” Vraney added. “... She didn’t complain. She just wanted to do what was best for the team.”

Laying it on the line

Daily News (West Bend, Wis.)

Published: Nov. 8, 2013

HS FOOTBALL

Laying it on the line

Area coaches talk about recent health scares with NFL coaches

By NICHOLAS DETTMANN

Daily News Sports Editor

Their weight fluctuates, their stress and blood pressure levels can reach high levels, and they have a hard time getting away from the game.

That’s the norm for a football coach, no matter what level: NFL, college or high school.

At the same time, however, they wouldn’t have it any other way.

“The game of football is very special,” Hartford Union coach Tom Noennig said. “It’s meant a lot to us as coaches. We’ve learned so much from coaches that we had as players and we want to go back and give the kids the best experience possible. I want them to have the best possible experience.

“You put others first a lot of times. It’s a big strain on your family, physically and mentally. At our level, it’s more selfinduced. We just try to do it for the right reasons.”

It was hard to find a coach that disagreed with Noennig’s analogy.

“It is a lot like parenting,” Kewaskum coach Jason Piittmann said. “What parent doesn’t want it better for their kid than they had? You want those kids to have a great experience.”

“My whole life is based off my football experience in high school,” Germantown coach Jake Davis said. “One of my main jobs is to create great experiences and memories.”

However, the cost for this is often one’s health.

The health of football coaches has surged to the forefront this week after Houston Texans head coach Gary Kubiak collapsed at halftime of Sunday’s game against the Indianapolis Colts. He was taken off the field on a stretcher. He suffered a ministroke.

Also this week, Denver Broncos coach John Fox had open heart surgery.

“It’s scary,” Piittmann said. “Knowing the age of some of these guys and their health problems and the connection of being football coaches creeps into the mind.”

While the sequence of events forced area coaches to put things in perspective as to why they coach and put themselves through such stress, they conclude they do it for the kids.

They just can’t see themselves doing anything else.

It gets frustrating, especially when pressure builds up from school administration and parents if a team isn’t doing well or they don’t like how the team is being run.

“Our stress is that you’re trying to mold young minds and keep them on the right track,” Jacklin said. “There are stresses in football that are different than in other sports.”

Why do they do it?

It’s because they have to, especially as technology has evolved to where coaches have access to game film in so many forms.

“There’s a lot of pressure in high school sports to win,” Jacklin said. “I find myself laying in bed and if I can’t sleep, I’m watching film on my phone; I’m watching film on my iPad.”

Sports are measured in wins and losses maybe more than ever, some coaches said. In order to maintain a program, it needs to be successful. If it’s not successful, support drops off, as does the interest from potential players.

When that happens, the ability to stay competitive and making the experience fun will go away too.

Jacklin said he lost more than 20 pounds during football season. Unfortunately, it had nothing to do with diet and exercise. It was the opposite.

Jacklin admitted he doesn’t eat well, if at all, during football season.

“The problem that I see with this type of job even at the high school level, is it’s a labor-intensive job,” Noennig said. “You don’t sleep well, you don’t eat well. You just don’t take care of yourself as you normally would during the offseason.

“It’s the scariest thing for us as coaches. It’s such a grind.”

But they love it.

“I’ve always wanted to help people and this is the best way I know it,” Davis said.

It’s easy to tell these coaches they should just quit. They know that. But they have such a vested interest in doing great things. At the NFL level, money is such a driving force too. Millions of dollars are at stake. At all levels, coaches live under a microscope. The intensity of the microscope varies depending on the level they coach at.

“Being a coach, you understand the stress,” Davis said. “I don’t think the average Joe really understands it.”

Davis added about coaches at the NFL level, “People are critiquing and criticizing what you’re doing. It’s tough. It takes its toll.”

That can apply to the high school level, too.

“It’s just the nature of beast when you’re really involved what you’re doing,” Jacklin said.

Each coach tries to set aside time for family and fun time. The biggest help, according to area coaches, is having a good support group, whether it’s other coaches or family members.

“I’m fortunate to have a tremendous wife that does a lot for me during the football season,” Davis said. “She really steps up. She understands what I’m doing for the kids. She helps me a lot.”

Suns' state dreams dashed again by Rockets

Daily News (West Bend, Wis.)

Published: Nov. 5, 2013

GIRLS VOLLEYBALL — WIAA SECTIONAL FINAL: NEENAH 3, EAST 0

Suns’ state dreams dashed again by Rockets

East loses 4th straight sectional final

By NICHOLAS DETTMANN

Daily News Sports Editor

MANITOWOC — From the first day of practice, West Bend East volleyball coach Colleen Hasse told her team if they worked hard and did their best, they would succeed.

So imagine what it was like for Hasse to look at her team after a season-ending loss and have to tell them their best wasn’t good enough.

“It sucks,” she said.

For the fourth year in a row, the Suns came up one victory short of the WIAA girls volleyball state tournament, losing in three sets to Neenah, 25-13, 26-24, 25-19, on Saturday night in a WIAA Division 1 sectional final at Lincoln High School.

The Suns (40-5) lost the 2010 and 2011 sectional finals to Fond du Lac and last year’s sectional final to Neenah (41-4).

“From a coaching standpoint, when you work so hard with a group of kids to get them prepared and just cannot seem to get through that roadblock that is the sectional finals,” Hasse said, “it takes a little beating on your pride.”

Hasse called Saturday’s loss the toughest in her career, which includes a loss in the 2007 state championship.

“It’s tough because you never want to see kids disappointed because of all the hard work they put in,” she said.

The battle was going to be tough for the Suns, who were trying to get back to state for the first time since 2008. Dating back to last year’s final against Neenah, the Suns had lost three straight matches to the Rockets, failing to win even a set in those matches.

The Rockets got the boost to start the match, scoring the match’s first three points.

East was able to tie the set at 4, but that was it. The Rockets got in a rhythm and the Suns were struggling. When Hasse took a timeout with the Suns down 23-11 in the first set, she said the team had made 16 errors of some kind up to that point.

“I can’t figure it out right now,” Hasse said about the slow start. “It’s probably something I’ll process for the next couple of weeks and figure out why it takes 25 points to get the first-game jitters out. I wish I could go back and take that first game away because we’d be looking at a whole different ballgame.”

In the second set, the Suns made it tough on the Rockets who, under coach Bruce Moriarty, have gone to 14 sectional finals in 16 seasons but are 5-9 in those matches. East has now lost three of its last four postseason meetings against Neenah.

“West Bend East makes you work really hard for everything you get,” Moriarty said. “I have so much respect for them, their coaching staff, their players. They play so hard and they make you earn everything you get.”

East appeared to have a chance to get the momentum late in the second set. Tied at 23, Geidel got a kill, but she was called for a net violation. So instead of the score being 24-23 East, it was Neenah with the lead. It was an unfortunate blow for the Suns, but they were able to tie the set again at 24. Then back-to-back blocks by Carley Ramich and Lexi Watt helped Neenah escape with the set victory.

“They were really giving us their best punch,” Moriarty said. “Had it been tied 1-1 at the end of the second set it’s a whole different ballgame. Mentally, it’s such an advantage to be up 2-0.”

East held a 7-4 lead in the third set before Neenah reeled off three straight points to tie it. The Rockets took the lead for good following a kill by Hope Werch to make it 10-9.

“What killed us was they ran their middle fast and we just couldn’t seem to get a block on that,” Hasse said. “I thought we did a pretty good job this time around getting better touches on the ball and their serve receive hits.

“It was just the rally plays where we would keep getting balls up and getting it back over and they would just keep punching them at us.”

The Suns had so much hope of breaking through to the state tournament. They had nine seniors, including three who were All-State selections last year (Delaney McCreary, Baylee Gross and Natalie Geidel). The Suns also had all six starters back, plus their first four spots off the bench.
The Suns finished in the top four in two of the state’s most prestigious volleyball tournaments, The Joust and The Sprawl. They won 40 matches for the first time since 2008. They went undefeated in the Wisconsin Little Ten for the first time in Hasse’s tenure, which dates back more than 10 seasons.
“We’ve got to look inside ourselves and we’ve got to see what we’ve got to do to make it better,” Hasse said. “While we’re trying to make ourselves better, everybody else is too.
“We can’t continue the way it is. Otherwise, teams are going to continue to get better and we’re going to stay status quo.”