I got some disturbing news last week when I heard the University of Northern Iowa was going to drop their baseball program. Being a former college baseball player myself, news like this really tears me apart. On top of it I played with and against a couple guys on the Panthers squad. Deric Manrique was a Sioux City North product that I played against in high school and Grant Grgurich was a teammate of mine at Marshalltown, a JuCo school in Marshalltown, Iowa. I was very honored to play with and against  both those guys and hope things work out for both of them.   Having said that, the Panthers need to raise 1.2 million dollars by April 5th to keep the 103 year old program going. If you would like to help or know of someone who would like to help visit www.supportunibaseball.com and make a donation.

High school basketball is in full force this week. South Sioux will take on Blair tonight (5:30) in the district semi-finals in Fremont, Nebraska. The winner will play in the district finals on Tuesday for a chance at state. Sioux City Heelan will face MOC-Floyd Valley in a 3A sub-state final at the Tyson Events Center on Wednesday (6:30) to punch their ticket to state.  Possibly the biggest game of the area Sioux City East will take on Sioux City West in a 4A sub-state final at the TEC following the Heelan/MOC game, to see which of those two teams will get to go to state. The 18-4 Heelan girls start their track to the 3A state title on Tuesday (6:30) against 18-6 Dubuque Wahlert in Des Moines and the 22-1 Sioux City North girls begin their 4A state title run on Wednesday (10:00 a.m.) against 17-6 Indianola.