After visiting with the Austin High coaches and teams during production of the 1999-2000 Winter Sports Extra, I am reminded of something Kris Fadness said:.

Tuesday, December 07, 1999

After visiting with the Austin High coaches and teams during production of the 1999-2000 Winter Sports Extra, I am reminded of something Kris Fadness said:

"I sense a strong level of commitment," said the Austin boys basketball coach of his team.

From what I’ve seen, that goes for more than just the basketball team.

The Austin gymnasts, for example, will be attempting to raise the school record for team point total for the third straight year.

They’ve been able to do it because the gymnasts train year-round. As their ability-level rises over time, the gymnasts’ routines become more difficult. When gymnasts execute routines with higher degrees of difficulty, it equates to higher scores.

In wrestling, a good majority of the returning Austin wrestlers will be moving up in weight classes this season.

Part of that is due to the natural growth of the young wrestlers. Another reason is that the a good many of the wrestlers have been hitting the iron, building muscle and getting bigger.

Anybody who watched Gina Golberg and the Austin girls basketball team on Friday sensed a strong level of commitment.

On Sunday, a couple days after the girls upset Rochester Mayo, Coach Sloan Suess was in Madison, Wis., where she traveled to watch Pat Summit, head coach of the Tennessee Lady Vols, gain her 700th career win by beating the Badgers.

To me, that says more than Suess likes to watch basketball.

To me, that says Suess is interested in observing and learning from the best.

This might sound sappy, but I wish every sports fan in Austin could have come with me on my visits to practice.

The time spent in all of the practices was encouraging, exciting, uplifting, and any other positive adjective you can come up with.

From the coaches on down, this crop of Austin sports teams is a committed lot.

One day before their home opener against New Ulm, I listened through a locker room door to Coach Denny Laumeyer as he talked to his team about striving to score five goals a game, to be better than they were a year ago by a goal a game.

The next day, I watched the hungry Packers score six.

On the pages in the Winter Sports Extra, you’re going to read some stories that were written by an excited man.

No matter what happens to the teams’ records as the year progresses, know this now: You’ve got a lot to be proud of Austin. The athletes and coaches representing the school and the city are committed.

I sense that.

I hope you do to.

Packers open in Winona

Fadness told me that as many as eight of 10 teams in the Big Nine could contend for the boys basketball title.

Winona is not one of them.

But that hasn’t kept Fadness from fretting about tonight’s opener in Winona.

"They shouldn’t be one of the teams competing for the conference," Fadness said, "but last year we beat them there just 44-41.

"You get in that orange gym and they come at you with gimmicky defenses. You just don’t know what they’re going to do."

Sounds like a tough place to play, doesn’t it?