Minneota, Breck School , Eden Prairie win Challenge Cup awards

Eden Prairie High School and Breck School of Golden Valley are repeat winners in the 2010-11 Challenge Cup competition and Minneota High School is a first-time Cup winner.

The Challenge Cup is a statewide, year-long competition among League member schools. Schools earn points for their success in post-season athletic and fine arts tournaments. The school earning the most points at the end of the year in each classification — A, AA and AAA — receives the traveling Challenge Cup. This year marks the first time the award will be presented to schools from three different classes. Previously there were two classes and only two Cup winners.

“We modified the scoring system last fall as it relates to team and individual sports and added another class to increase school participation,” explained Lisa Lissimore, the League associate director who oversees the program. “We congratulate Minneota, Breck and Eden Prairie for winning the Challenge Cup in their respective classes.”

Defending Cup champion Eden Prairie has won the award five times in eight years. The Eagles won the Class AA Cup previously in 2006, 2008, 2009 and 2010, and this year’s Class AAA Cup. They were runners-up in 2007. This past school year they participated in 23 state tournaments and earned 829 Challenge Cup points. The Eagles won team championships in girls’ cross country, boys’ hockey, girls’ soccer and had individual champions in boys’ track and field (triple jump), boys’ swimming and diving (200-yard medley relay and 100-yard butterfly), and girls’ swimming and diving (100-yard butterfly, 200-yard medley relay and 100-yard backstroke).One Eden Prairie swimmer, Rachel Bootsma, set a national record in the 100-backstroke with a time of 51.31 (previous mark was 51.85).

Repeat Challenge Cup winner Breck School scored 340 points to win the Class AA Cup, having won last year’s Class A Cup. The Mustangs participated in nine state tournaments and finished first in a variety of team/individual events including girls’ golf (individual champion), boys’ tennis (team and singles), boys’ swimming and diving (100-yard backstroke and 200-yard medley relay), and girls’ track and field (4x200 meter relay, 400 meter dash and 4x400 meter relay). Breck School also earned points in girls’ gymnastics, girls’ swimming and diving, and both the girls’ and boys’ hockey tournaments.

Minneota is the new Class A Challenge Cup winner with 161 points. With an enrollment of 160 students, the Vikings competed in six state tournaments and finished as high as third in both football and girls’ volleyball. Other points came from runners in the boys’ and girls’ state cross country running meet and three wrestlers who placed third in that tournament. This is the school’s first Cup.

The Challenge Cup is sponsored by Wells Fargo, the League’s premier corporate sponsor. Representatives from both organizations will present the traveling Challenge Cup to each school winner this fall.

Other schools finishing in the top five of the 2010-11 Challenge Cup race: Class AAA — Wayzata (707 points), Apple Valley (484 points), Edina (444 points), and Minnetonka (391 points); Class AA — St. Cloud Cathedral (336); The Blake School of Minneapolis (290), Rochester Lourdes (286), and Perham (284); Class A — Springfield (140), Adrian (106), Maranatha Christian Academy of Brooklyn Park (93) and Lanesboro (91).

For a complete list of all the schools that earned Challenge Cup points for the 2010-11 school year, click HERE

Courtesy: Lisa Lissimore/Minnesota State High School League