As Buckman Billygoats players celebrate in the background, Hutchinson Huskies pitcher Lane Glaser flips his cap in disappointment following the Huskies’ 1-0 loss Saturday at Dassel.
Hutchinson manager Mike Kutter, center, wipes his brow as he talks to Huskies players following the team’s loss to Buckman Saturday.
Buckman catcher Matt Kummet tags out Hutchinson left fielder Tyler Schiller as he tries to score from second base on a single in the second inning.
Hutchinson first baseman Jake Wendland awaits a throw from pitcher Lane Glaser as a Buckman runner dives back to the bag.
It was like the repeat of a bad dream.
Standing just outside the visiting team dugout at Saints Field in Dassel, Hutchinson Huskies manager Mike Kutter struggled Saturday evening to find the words for another stunning, heartbreak.
For the second time in as many years, an opposing team scored a walk-off win that ended a Huskies season that held so much promise.
“It’s pretty disappointing, because we actually had the same thing happen to us last year against Bluffton,” Kutter said after the Buckman Billygoats scored in the bottom of the ninth to upend the Huskies 1-0 in the Minnesota Baseball Association Class C State Tournament. “You know, losing sucks. You want to win every game you can until you’re playing on Monday, but it just didn’t happen today.”
A year ago, Bluffton scored three runs in the bottom of the 12th to earn a walk-off 4-3 win that eliminated the Huskies from the state tournament.
Hutchinson finished this season 26-12, which included a midseason 12-game winning streak and an 18-2 run that propelled the Huskies into the round of 16 at the state tournament.
Behind the standout pitching of Lane Glaser and solid defensive play, the Huskies won their first two games at state, beating Fairmont 2-0 in the first round and Hinckley 8-1 in the second round. And the Huskies looked to be following that familiar formula again.
Glaser, who had been the Huskies’ ace all season with a 7-4 record and 1.12 earned run average, started against the Buckman Billygoats, his third start of the state tournament. He won the first two, going 8 2/3 scoreless innings against Fairmont and going the distance in the win over Hinckley.
And Glaser was dominant again Saturday, scattering seven hits and striking out five. Unfortunately, for the Huskies, Buckman’s Matt Tautges was just as dominant allowing just four hits and striking out six.
Hutchinson’s best scoring opportunity came early, when Tyler Schiller singled with one out and moved to second on a fielder’s choice. Zach Kuseske then singled to right, and Schiller hustled around third toward home. But a strong, accurate throw by Buckman right fielder Aaron Weber to catcher Matt Kummet caught a diving Schiller at the plate.
“It was one of those games where it literally can go any way,” Kutter said. “We maybe ran ourselves out of an inning … but you got to take chances, too.”
Hutchinson had two runners in both the fourth and eighth innings, but couldn’t capitalize.
And Buckman made the most of its last, best opportunity. The Billygoats’ first two batters reached base. Following a trip to the mound by Kutter, Glaser seemed to find his groove again, pop out, then a fly out to right. Hutchinson just missed an opportunity for an inning-ending double play on the second fly out as the Billygoats’ Jack Suska wandered too far toward third. The Huskies couldn’t complete the play, however.
“They had a good approach those last few innings,” Glaser said. “I kind of left a couple pitches up, and when they didn’t bunt with guys on first and second, no one out, that kind of opens the door for us to get a double play and get out of there. But we didn’t quite get that.”
Four pitches later, Buckman’s Kummet — who had three hits in the game — singled, driving home Suska with the winning run.
“Their guy just kind of locked in,” Glaser said. “It was a two-strike count, but he put a good swing on the ball. It just didn’t go our way. That’s baseball.”
Seeing another season end in such heartbreaking fashion was difficult. But the Huskies chose to find positives.
“It’s not about that moment,” Kutter said of the winning run. “it’s kind of, you look at the whole season and look at what we did. We got to the Sweet 16 and gave ourselves a chance. Everybody wants to play for Labor Day weekend, and we got here. It just wasn’t our day, wasn’t meant to be, whatever you want to call it.”
“That’s a great game. That’s a really good team,” Glaser said. “You know, good for them. It is what it is. We’ll be back next year. That’s how it works.”
Kyle Messner spearheaded the new grandstand project in 2020 and has been playing for the Huskies since 1986.
Original stadium seating at Veterans Memorial Field at the Dave Mooney Baseball Complex has never been upgraded in its 38 years. The seating lacks handrails and shade for patrons and is the driving force for the behind the new grandstand project.
Hutchinson Huskies Baseball Organization got the green light from Hutchinson City Council Aug. 22 to begin planning for a new grandstand and other improvements at Veterans Memorial Field.
The next phase includes schematic design with cost estimates that could be used to bid the project and will cost the city $10,000-$15,000.
The current grandstand dates back to 1985 and has not been upgraded during its 38 years.
“It’s a safety issue that I’m really concerned about,” Kyle Messner, a Hutchinson Huskies board member and player, said. “There’s no hand railing. We have a lot of elderly people that come and watch our games. It just takes one person to fall down and you got a lawsuit.”
Earlier this year the city hired Widseth, an architecture and engineering firm, to complete a preliminary design and cost estimate for the new grandstand. During the Aug. 22 City Council meeting, Widseth architect Dana Hlebichuk estimated the project would cost $625,000.
“This is a preliminary estimate,” Hlebichuk said. “We tried to take all contingencies into effect with cost overruns, increased cost of steel, concrete, things like that, as well as price escalations over the next year. This is a very conservative estimate.”
City Council members Pat May and Chad Czmowski raised concerns about funding for the project.
While the proposed stadium project is exciting, it could strain available funds, potentially affecting other projects, Czmowski said.
Besides a new grandstand, the plan includes a new concrete walk. Until a more in-depth analysis is done, however, Widseth will not know the extent of concrete and resurfacing required, Hlebichuk said.
“My first plan was just the grandstand itself,” Messner said. “But the blacktop is getting bad and it slopes toward the field. So when it rains all the water goes on the field.”
The proposed, fully covered grandstand would seat 381 people and includes six handicap areas for wheelchairs, 147 stadium seats and bench seating for 228. The current grandstand holds 250 people with only the middle section covered and provides no handicap seating areas.
“Does it (grandstand) serve its purpose now? It does,” Messner said. “But a lot of people, when they sit here, they can’t sit straight. They have to sit sideways because of the distance between the seats. Also, on hot days like last weekend, it was 95 degrees out, and, if you play here, there’s hardly any shade.”
Fundraising for the project has been a grass-roots effort, according to Messner. He has dedicated the last three years to crowdsourcing the grandstand by handing out fliers, printing donation information on scorecards, and updating the Huskies website.
“I’m going door-to-door, business-to-business,” he said.
So far, the Huskies have raised $250,000 through donations and pledges from local businesses and individuals.
“The Huskies have indicated that they have donors in line, but those donors have not made a commitment yet,” Czmowski said. “We need to know how much those donors are going to commit before we know what the city’s portion would be, because, it could swing wildly. It could be $50,000 or $350,000.”
According to Messner, Minnesota Baseball Association state tournaments bring a lot of revenue to host cities, averaging 20,000 and 22,000 people between the tournament sites.
In 2016 the Huskies hosted the state tournament, which generated $460,000. In 2025 the Huskies will host the tournament again, and Messner projects the event will generate $575,000 over the three weekends.
“Since I started this project and got prices back in 2020, materials have gone up 30%,” Messner said. “That’s why if we wait a couple more years it could go up more and be more expensive. That’s why I’d like to jump on it now and start in 2024.”
According to Hutchinson City Administrator Matt Jaunich, this phase in planning is just to get a hard estimate of the cost. City Council will have two more opportunities to halt the project, one before approving an advertisement for bids and the second after bids are received.
“I believe we can get this grandstand built by ’25 and I’m going to continue to raise funds and try to make it happen,” Messner said.
The addition of a federal holiday, and how it will affect teacher contract negotiations, sparked a spirited discussion during a Hutchinson School Board work session last week.
Juneteenth, a day commemorating the end of slavery in the United States, and how it will affect 2024 contract negotiations, divided the board as members debated trying to maintain current contracts, and to an extent school policy, to 10 holidays, or to add an 11th holiday to 2024 contracts.
Essentially, no employees in the school district can work on Juneteenth due to federal mandates. For employees with fewer than 260-day contracts this isn’t as big of an issue, but for those with 260-day contracts this became a problem.
Employees with 260-day contracts currently have four to 10 holidays a year that are predetermined in their contract — New Year’s Day, Presidents’ Day, Good Friday, Memorial Day, Independence Day, Labor Day, Thanksgiving Day, the day after Thanksgiving, Christmas Eve and Christmas. This also falls in line with school policy.
“The recommendation would be that the 260-day employees would have that holiday (Juneteenth) because they have to work every day and you can’t really take a day away from the 260-day contract,” Superintendent Dan Deitte said.
A workday only counts if it is paid such as if it was worked or was considered a paid holiday, which is why the board couldn’t just have it be a non-paid day.
One proposal was to have employees swap holidays or have floating holidays. For instance, an employee could choose to work Presidents’ Day or Good Friday since they must have Juneteenth off. Those who were against giving the employees an 11th holiday figured this would be a fair compromise if it was possible.
“Well, I think we all just take a realistic approach to this, a dollar approach to this and find a day that’s been added to the calendar that is not a required date to not be working,” Board Member Michael Massmann said. “I mean, legislatively this is a requirement that we can work around. But I also don’t think that because of that we should just fold and add it as an 11th day. It’s just that’s forcing the district to spend money it didn’t plan on.”
Deitte clarified that the 11th holiday would already have been budgeted as a workday, so there would be no increase in district expense.
“Just to be really clear, we’re not going to add money to our budget,” Deitte said. “We’re going to pay people not to work. I don’t want the perception that we’re adding more money to our budget that we don’t already have.”
Board Member Sara Pollmann framed the discussion as an argument about how much the school district values their employees.
“We have employees who will have to work off the clock to make up the lost time on Juneteenth,” she said. “I’m not saying every employee will, but many have things that just have to get done. I would rather reward them because it shows the district values them. And because the money is already budgeted I have no qualms voting for an 11th holiday.”
Board Member Danny Olmstead likened the argument to that of a salaried, exempt employee, who works until the job is completed and are paid a set amount regardless of hours worked.
“It’s a stupid holiday … in the sense of where it falls and how it messes up all of (the work) that needs to be done,” he said. “(The employees) are basically salaried exempt and paid to do the work no matter what. So it’s something we need to figure out what other day we can make it be.”
The talks about holiday swapping continued for a while with the rest of the argument fizzling out as Massmann said, “in the next set of negotiations, we can’t just set the precedent that there’s still only 10 days. June 19 will still be a required day off, at which point we’ll have to say you can’t work for 259 days, at which point they’ll say we already have 10 built in, you’re required to pay us 11. It’s a literal handcuff into an 11th paid holiday without any vote from this board.”
Deitte and Board Chairwoman Tiffany Barnard called to hold off further conversation until more information could be provided. All members voted to table the Juneteenth discussion.
Ava Raisanen, a new art teacher at Hutchinson Middle School, creates a clay frog piece to show her students.
Ava Raisanen
Ava Raisanen works on a drawing she will use to teach her students.
Ava Raisanen, a new art teacher at the middle school, has her students start right away on finishing their project for the week. The 6th graders have been working on drawing a castle for the 1st week of school.
New Middle School Art Teacher Ava Raisanen walks around her classroom helping the 6th graders finish their projects and getting them supplies as needed.
Ava Raisanen, the new middle school art teacher, keeps a close eye on her students as the end of the first week draws near. The kids are excited to complete their projects and finish the school day to go home for the weekend.
Ava Raisanen, a new middle school art teacher, talks with her students about their projects. The 6th graders have been working on making castles for their 1st week back to school.
Ava Raisanen, a new middle school art teacher, works with a student who needed a little help getting started on a mini-project.
College is a place where inspirations and passions can shift. People go in with a childhood dream of where they want to be and find themselves following a completely different path.
That was the case for one new teacher at Hutchinson Middle School.
Ava Raisanen, a Bethel University graduate from 2022, started her career last week as an art teacher at the middle school.
She had a different focus when she started college.
”I originally wanted to be a veterinary technician, but after a lot of thought, realized art teaching was for me,” she said.
Those thoughts were centered around Raisanen’s time in middle school and high school, and teachers who had inspired her.
“Those were the teachers who genuinely cared about their students and were passionate about their content area,” she said.
But why teach middle school?
“In my field experience, I found that I was most energized by middle school,” Raisanen said. “I enjoyed all ages, but I could really connect with the middle school students. I also enjoy the variety of skills they have in art. Middle school is a great time to be inspired by art, create their own original artwork, and build confidence through the art process.”
Seeing students explore and learn about themselves is part of what drives Raisanen to keep teaching.
”I love making a difference,” she said. “I get up every day to teach my passion. I teach because of the impact I can make on my students, giving them a comfortable place to learn, and teaching them skills in art. Seeing kids get excited about art motivates me to teach — it’s beautiful to see them excited about a new painting technique or problem-solving with each other.”
Raisanen enjoys being in Hutchinson. It allows her to be close to her hometown, but she was also enthralled with the community Hutchinson.
“I can see that the community is keeping teachers here,” she said. “People who went to school here came back to teach. And some teachers have been in this district for decades. Seeing people who are excited about their job and community made me feel at home.”
It has also made her curious.
“I’m looking forward to learning more about my students’ backgrounds and what fascinates them as I teach here in Hutchinson,” Raisanen said.
