2008 Year in Review

Second Annual Corey Ottens Tournament

The Second Annual Corey Ottens Memorial Alumni Basketball Tournament was held on Saturday, October 4, 2008 at the Morrison High School.

Corey graduated from Morrison High School in 1989. He served as the Morrison High School Freshman Basketball Coach. Corey lost his strong willed fight to cancer on June 29, 2005.

The Memorial Tournament started in 2007 as a way to raise money for the Hall of Fame Committee. In 2008 the proceeds from the tournament will go to the Hall of Fame Committee and to the Corey Ottens Scholarship. This scholarship is given to a male athlete who has demonstrated integrity, strength of character, a good academic record, and a commitment to pursue a college degree.

Gus Linke, Jr. had originally thought of the idea while sitting in a Morrison Hall of Fame Committee meeting. Since Morrison is such a great sports community, he thought it would be a great idea to see athletes from the past, get their old teams together and compete against other Morrison Alumni. Not only would it be a lot of fun, but would also be a great way to raise money for the Hall of Fame and for the Corey Ottens Scholarship Fund.

All the proceeds of the spectator entry fee donations will go to Susie Ottens for the Scholarship. All proceeds from the tournament fees will go the Hall of Fame Committee and to the Scholarship.

Teams representing this years Tournament were:

1970’s – Terry Wilkens, Kevin Hook, Roger Smith, Randy Stralow, Gary Venhuizen, Tim Swanson, Pat Renkes, Dan Nelson, Steve Hook, Kelvin Tenboer and Loren Tenboer.

1986 – Mitch Edlund, Jim Bogle, Randy Kahl, Al Tenboer, Mark Laufenburg, Brent Vandermyde, David Zickert, Scott Wollam, Frank Mendoza, and Scott Mouw.

1989 – Tom Vanderlaan, Brett Goff, Kent Bush, Gus Linke, Kent Wiersema, Jim Spangler, Pat Young and Scott Oehlberg.

1993-94 – Josh Olson, Shawn Dykstra, Scott Preston, Greg Pruis, Tony Eakle, Bryan Carter, Joe Robbins, Brad Tichler and Kris Dorsey.

1995 – Daren Dykstra, Chad Goff, Mitch Milnes, Derrin Huizenga, Scott Pruis, Tim Dauphin, Dan Vanderleest and Matt Stevens.

1997-98 – Nate Anderson, Matt Tichler, Aaron Wiersema, Jed Swanson, Casey Hahn, Nick Ivey, Andrew Noble and BJ Dykstra.

2000 – Jason Buikema, Jay Nelson, Matt Tegeler, Ryan Wiersema, Cory Pruis, Jason McDearmon, Seth Bush and Adam Temple.

2008 – Doug Mouw, Dustin Jones, Richard Nelson, Ryan Nelson, Nate Vandermyde and Charlie Cady. Last years All-Tournament Team was Mitch Edlund, Dave Edlund, Randy Kahl, Tom Vanderlaan, Brett Goff, Chad Goff, Nathan Anderson, Tony Eakle, Shawn Dykstra and Josh Olson.

2007 Special Awards were given to:
Biggest Guns (Arms) – Casey Hahn
Best Dressed – Derrik Schroeder
Worst Hair at the end of the day – Tony Eakle
Hasn’t lost a step award – Dave Edlund
He wasn’t that good in high school – Josh Olson.

Editors note: This year I was able to attend the tournament. What a joy. I have not taken basketball pictures for a couple of years. It was fun to see some of the “boys” I started out taking pictures of when they were in high school. There were a lot of them I did not recognize (even by looking at the roster of the teams). What a great way for these guys and the spectators to contribute to the Hall of Fame and also to the Ottens family in Corey’s memory.

by Dawn Zuidema, theCity1.com
October 11, 2008