Articles
Northridge (IN) senior wrestler honored at halftime
Tuesday, Northridge (IN) senior wrestler Connor Graber was recognized at halftime of the boys basketball game vs. Fairfield. Graber won Northridge’s first wrestling state title this past Saturday in Indianapolis in the 182 lb weight class.
Everman (TX) dedicates Gary T. Balch Field
Sunday February 18th, the entire Bulldog family of Everman High School (TX) turned its attention to celebrating the past and the future. Over 200+ family, friends, students, and teammates came together to celebrate and dedicate the new Gary T. Balch Ballpark at Everman High School.
Full story here
Pinckney (MI) Girls Boardercross Team wins state championship
This past week, the Pinckney Pirate Girls Boardercross team completed their wire-to-wire state championship at the MHSAA State Meet- Mt. Brighton. The girls never took less than a 1st place finish in every event this season.
More
Fishers (IN) Varsity Cheer wins UCA Large Division National Championship
“The energy was insane,” said junior Leah David. “When they announced second place and it wasn’t our name, time stopped… There’s nothing that describes that feeling.”
Fishers High School brought home Indiana’s first national title in Large Division 1 cheerleading on Sunday at the UCA National Championship in Florida
Full story here
Full routine here
AC Flora (SC) Baseball Achieves Top 25 National Ranking
In Collegiate Baseball’s pre-season rankings, the AC Flora Falcons came in 24th in the nation for 2018.
Coming off a 6th State Championship in 2017, the Falcons are positioned well to compete for another in South Carolina. Visit Collegiate Baseball’s 2018 High School Pre-Season Poll for the complete list.
Full story on floraathletic.com
Kent City (MI) Boys Basketball moves up to #3 ranked team in Michigan AP
In the latest Michigan polls, Kent City’s undefeated varsity boys basketball team (16-0) continue to climb, moving to #3 in the Associated Press (A.P.) (from #4), and #2 in the Detroit Free Press (from #3).
On Friday, the boys clinched the CSAA Silver against the 13-2 Morley Stanwood Mohawks in overtime.
Full story about the team’s success here
Tips from the Top 100: Glendale Prep's Comeback and other January Success Stories
An integral part of being a partner with VNN is the healthy competition between schools hoping to crack the top of our National Top 100 . Producing the best content and keeping their fans excited about high school sports all help – but exactly what are VNN’s high school athletic departments doing that make the most impact? Here’s where we highlight the top schools in our network for this past month, January 2018.
Leveling up – what does it take?
Glendale Preparatory Academy in Glendale, Arizona used to be on the outside looking in on VNN’s Top 100 with 8,978 page views in January of last year. This month they hiked all the way to the number two spot in the VNN Top 100 with over 90,000 page views during the month! That 913% increase from last year didn’t happen overnight but because, “We strive to be accurate in all of our schedules, giving updates and posting scores as they become available. We also have great pictures that we showcase on our site,” according to Jonathan Rickey, Director of Athletics. With an attitude like that it’s hard not to succeed.
A Michigan school getting real with mental health:
The West Bloomfield Lakers were the first school in the nation to implement a mental health curriculum to their health program. Their article posted about the incredible new PrepareU course created by one of their alumni, Ryan Beale, was the top read article in the entire VNN network for the month of January. The program is “designed to move the needle” for mental health and how people cope with mental illnesses.
This story came at a relevant time for the national mental health conversation – where January 31st was #BellLetsTalk day, which promoted mental health awareness, acceptance and action built on 4 key pillars: fighting stigma around mental health issues, improving access to care, supporting world-class research and leading by example in the workplace. #BellLetsTalk began as a Canadian campaign with the National Hockey League which raised 5 cents per post for those that included the hashtag #BellLetsTalk, and the West Bloomfield article got a big boost from what was happening nationally.
What keeps them great?
A school that has made a home from themselves within our Top 20 for the last year is Scripps Ranch from San Diego, California. In addition to keeping their site fresh weekly with new photo galleries, posts and featured stories, the Falcons have started using Rapid Replay, a new way to post highlight videos of their teams via a mobile app. Implementing Rapid Replay has elevated Scripps and kept them at the top of our network. VNN Network schools can get started with Rapid Replay by following this link: http://www.rapidreplay.co/get-started-vnn/
Hot tips:
- Photo galleries are the number one way to get fans on your site and to get them to stay on your site. If you would like to learn how to create galleries on your VNN site here is a tutorial that will help you.
Example: Our Top 100 leader, Glendale Prep, prides themselves on great photo content, check them out!
- Athlete of the Month is a great way to get the fans involved. Here is a link on how to embed polls to VNN websites.
Example: Trousdale County Yellowjackets “Athlete of the Winter”
The full Top 100 includes such heavy hitters as Hoover (AL), Temple (TX), Sherwood (MD), Fishers (IN) and Brunswick (OH) – see the full list here.
VNN and Michigan Medicine partner to combat distracted driving
To say the least, the AAA Foundation for Traffic Safety statistics behind distracted driving are alarming.
-Teens that looked away from the road for 2 seconds or longer were almost 4 times more likely to crash or nearly crash
-92% of teens said that they do at least one distracting activity every time they drive.
-Teens who thought their parents drove while distracted more often, drove distracted themselves more often.
In fact, 6 out of ten crashes involving teen drivers occur due to being distracted behind the wheel, making this issue one of the leading causes of motor accidents and fatalities in the US. And while text messaging comes up early and often, interacting with passengers, reaching for something, personal grooming, and singing also came up as reasons why teens find themselves distracted behind the wheel.
It’s with these statistics in mind that the University of Michigan Medicine Health System and the CS Mott Children’s Hospital created the Drive Smart campaign. Aimed to increase awareness to the dangers of distracted driving to teens and their parents across Michigan Medicine’s footprint, the team at re:group Media connected with Lighthouse Media and VNN to bring the message direct to just under 90 local communities across Michigan and Northern Ohio at scale through their high school athletic websites.
The campaign, which launched January 5th with a goal to reach 2.7M, promotes Drive Smart’s “Three Important Steps Parents Can Do Before Their Teen Learns to Drive” on the Drive Smart home page and is comprised of site take-overs, which put the message front-and-center on all home pages, content pages, and team schedules.
Together with Michigan Medicine, we’re hoping the campaign will help move the needle on this issue that affects young families across the country, and will ensure parents have all the information they need to educate their teens about how treacherous driving distracted really is.
__
Interested in connecting your brand to thousands of high school sports communities across the US? Visit our advertising page for a Media Kit and more info.
VNN Partner Schools contribute 20 to Nation's Top 100 College Football Signees
This past Wednesday commemorated National Signing Day, the first chance that 2018’s high school seniors can sign a binding letter of intent to play collegiate sports in the NCAA next year. Signings can happen in any sport, and across the VNN network we saw athletes at our partner schools committing to the next level in track, soccer, and lacrosse among others.
Often, the most-followed commitments by fans and sports media are for college football, and this year our network didn’t disappoint. VNN partner schools contributed 20 of the nation’s top 100 signees to next year’s college football landscape, including the top two prospects in the 247sports rating system, Cartersville (GA)‘s Trevor Lawrence, who committed to Clemson, and Harrison (GA)’s Justin Fields, who committed to the Georgia Bulldogs. Both are quarterbacks.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eTDQ2u14zO8
Overall, it looks as if VNN’s Class of 2018 bleeds purple and orange, with the Clemson Tigers recruiting the most of our top partner school players with four, followed by the Texas Longhorns with three, and Ohio State, USC, and Georgia with two a piece. Signing one VNN-partner school player out of the Top 100 was Miami, Florida State, Washington, Ole Miss, Florida, Penn State, and Texas A&M.
Here’s the full list, sorted by 247 Sports prospect ranking:
#1 Trevor Lawrence – QB – Cartersville (GA) – Clemson
#2 Justin Fields – QB – Harrison (GA) – Georgia
#14 KJ Henry – WDE – West Forsyth (NC) – Clemson
#17 Jack Carman – OT – Fairfield (OH) – Clemson
#18 Adam Anderson – OLB – Rome (GA) – Georgia
#19 Caden Sterns – S – Steele (TX) – Texas
#26 Derion Kendrick – WR – South Point (SC) – Clemson
#27 Lorenzo Lingard – RB – University (FL) – Miami
#28 Olaijah Griffin – CB – Mission Viejo (CA) – USC
#30 Jaelen Gill – APB – Westerville South (OH) – Ohio State
#32 Isaac Taylor-Stuart – CB – Helix (CA) – USC
#34 Tyreke Smith – WDE – Cleveland Heights (OH) – Ohio State
#47 Jalen Green – CB – Heights (TX) – Texas
#50 Anthony Lytton – CB – Wise (MD) – Florida State
#59 Marquis Spiker – WR – Murietta Valley (CA) – Washington
#63 Matt Corral – QB – Long Beach Poly (CA) – Ole Miss
#64 Anthony Cook – CB – Lamar (TX) – Texas
#65 Rasheed Walker – OT – North Point (MD) – Penn State
#75 Leon O’Neal Jr. – S – Cypress Springs (TX) – Texas A&M
#89 Justin Watkins – WR – East Ridge (FL) – Florida
Defending Wisconsin State Champion Waukesha South Blackshirts set several swimming records
At last week’s Conference meet, the defending state-champion Waukesha South (WI) Blackshirts had a field day, setting conference records in the 200 Freestyle, 500 Freestyle, 200 Free Relay, and school records in the 50 Free and 100 Backstroke.
Full story here
St. Aug (LA) Marching 100 announces 2018 Mardi Gras Parade Schedule
It’s that time again down in NOLA. Carnival season has kicked off and that means that the St. Augustine Marching 100 will be high-stepping through the city on many different parade routes starting this weekend through Mardi Gras, February 13.
Check out staugathletics.org for a full-schedule