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Esko mobbed Finn Furcht after he struck out Marshall star Carter Boos (foreground) to end the final game. Photos by John Gilbert.

Esko High School, as well as Grand Rapids, overcame daunting challenges to win their section baseball tournaments and reach the state tournament.

Esko was hammered by an excellent Marshall outfit 9-0, putting Esko into the elimination bracket, where the Eskomos had to use ace pitcher Dylan Marciulionis to get past a solid Proctor outfit 3-1 to reach the final against unbeaten Marshall. 

With Marciulionis unavailable to face Marshall, junior Sam Haugen, who had started only one game all season, fired a 2-hitter and Esko erupted late to whip the Hilltoppers 10-3. 

Junior Sam Haugen pitched "the best game of my life" to beat Marshall 10-3 on a 2-hitter.

That forced a second game later that day, and Finn Furcht, who had been pulled after one inning of the 9-0 loss, was brilliant, throwing a 4-hitter and Esko won 4-2 to return to the Class AA state tournament it won last season. He finished with a flourish, striking out the side in the seventh inning, and ending the game by striking out Carter Boos, Marshall’s best hitter.

Finn Furcht lasted one inning when Esko lost 9-0 to Marshall, but was the hero with a 4-hit, 4-2 championship victory over the Hilltoppers.

Meanwhile, top-seeded Grand Rapids was host to the 7AAA tournament and was upset by Denfeld in the first game, so the Thunderhawks also had to wade through the elimination bracket to get its rematch against unbeaten Denfeld. Grand Rapids found its offense for a 10-0 victory, forcing a final game, and the Thunderhawks won 2-0 to advance to state.

Those were the most positive happenings of last week, but there were a lot more incidents that were less positive for Duluth area and Minnesota sports fans. Consider the coaching situation.

Natalie Darwitz of the PWHL Minnesota tournament champions, and Darby Hendrickson, long-term assistant coach of the Minnesota Wild, are both eliminated from our sports picture — neither one by their own choosing.

Maura Crowell left a vacancy as head coach of the UMD women’s hockey program after nine years — by her own choosing, returning home to become head coach at Dartmouth and be closer to her mother, after the death of her father two summers ago. 

“I compromised my whole life for my profession when I left Harvard to come to UMD,” said Crowell. “I missed a lot of time with my father after he got cancer two years ago, but now, my mother is almost 80, and we have a daughter who is just about to turn 3, so I’ve decided it’s time to compromise my career for the sake of my family.”

Then there is Mike Sertich, the popular former UMD men’s hockey coach who moved back to his roots near Virginia, Minnesota, a few years ago. He was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer two years ago, and the story of his aggressive pursuit of medical treatments for that disease have sounded like it was under control. Until last week.

“I was feeling good and the doctors were pretty convinced that the chemotherapy and radiation would stop the original tumor in my pancreas from growing,” Sertich told me by telephone after spending five days in a Duluth hospital for further tests and evaluation. “When they went in to put a stent in my duodenum, to aid my digestion, they found that instead of shrinking, the original tumor had grown at an alarming rate.

“The oncologist sent me a note saying there was nothing more they could do with chemo or radiation to help my condition. So I have no choice; I’m starting hospice home care. They will send a doctor and a nurse to my home, and we’ll see what happens. I have no pain, no problem, and I feel great. Right now, I’m sitting on my deck, having a cup of coffee.”

Sertich said he can only eat certain things, and all of it must be pureed, turning fruit and vegetables into soup. 

“But I’m not giving up,” he added. “I’ve always been a positive person, not negative, so I’m going to fight this as long as I can. In fact, right now I’m thinking about going into Canelake’s Candy shop in Virginia for a turtle sundae.”

In the Twin Cities, wild general manager Bill Guerin suddenly ambushed Darby Hendrickson with the news that he was being let go, after a long-term career as an assistant. 

That was a shock, but even moreso was the stunning dismissal of Natalie Darwitz, who took on the role of general manager for the first year of the women’s pro league. She did a fantastic job of assembling a team capable of rising up in the playoffs to win the women’s version of the Stanley Cup in their first season.

The league operates all six franchises, and Ken Klee was virtually forced in as head coach, and did a commendable job. Insiders say that Klee said he had applied for the coaching job at the start but said he wanted to be both coach and general manager. 

When he agreed to the coaching job, the combination seemed to work well — Darwitz got the players and Klee coached them. But right after their tournament victory, Darwitz was let go, with the league saying there was a difference of opinion between Klee and Darwitz that couldn’t be solved, and a few players had taken Klee’s side, so Darwitz had to be let go. 

Do we think that if the Wild won the Stanley Cup next season and a couple players had a disagreement with Guerin’s operation of the club, that the NHL would dismiss Bill Guerin? 

Of course not. In any disagreement, the GM is above the coach. But in this case, the PHWL wanted Klee more than it ever wanted Darwitz, so we are supposed to overlook the inconvenient fact that in a major disagreement, the male gets league backing, and the female GM gets fired. 

We also can observe Klee next season; he’d better win, because he has the pressure of high expectations on his shoulders now. Also, he conducted the new year’s draft earlier this week, so it looks like he got the combined coaching and GM jobs, after all.

We can all gather next week down at Canal Park for the always raucous entertainment of Grandma’s Marathon, which starts at Two Harbors and ends at Canal Park, complete with music, food and a general carnival atmosphere.

And while we’re at it, say a prayer and send best wishes to Mike Sertich, an iconic figure in Iron Range and UMD hockey, who is fighting the good fight.