Talking Preps: Recent Episodes
Star Tribune
Star Tribune prep reporters David La Vaque and James Paulsen are bringing all you Minnesota high school sports enthusiasts another way to stay connected to the action.
Prep reporters David La Vaque and Jim Paulsen share wit and wisdom from five memorable weeks of football
Law shared insights with Star Tribune preps reporter David La Vaque on how to get a greater-Minnesota community to support lacrosse
Minneapolis North boys' basketball coach Larry McKenzie has the pulse on this week's state tournament. HIs Polars are embracing the goal of Class 2A state championship or bust.
Former Waconia girls' basketball coach Carl Pierson, author of the new book "The Other Side of Glory" takes us through all four classes of this week's state tournament
Lou Nanne, who began calling boys' hockey state tournament games in 1964, remembers starting his analyst job while still playing in the NHL, discusses this week's Class 2A field with Star Tribune prep reporter David La Vaque and shares why he always pulls for the favored teams.
Wayzata boys' hockey coach Pat O'Leary, who won a NCAA championship as a player and a state title as a coach, tells Star Tribune reporter David La Vaque about those experiences as well as unpacking the great section final matchups this week.
Winny Brodt Brown and Star Tribune preps reporter David La Vaque discuss team matchups and players to watch in the Class 1A and 2A quarterfinals, plus the growing physicality of the sport.
Rogers girls' basketball coach Karlee Anderson gives Star Tribune preps reporter David La Vaque an inside look at what goes into winning 18 consecutive games.
Anderson, the former KFAN radio personality, is the current Minnesota Hockey District 2 Girls’ Coordinator as well as General Manager of their Minnesota Hockey High Performance and Tier 1 teams. He and Star Tribune reporter David La Vaque tackle a group of sections loaded with talented teams eager to reach the state tournament.
Star Tribune prep writers David La Vaque and Jim Paulsen canvass the winter sports landscape, offering insights and opinions as the top teams prepare for playoff action.
Braziel chats with Star Tribune preps reporter David La Vaque about the undefeated Columbia Heights Hylanders, beating "The Machine" DeLaSalle and anticipating a showdown with another private-school power, Totino-Grace, in the section playoffs.
Star Tribune high school reporter David La Vaque chats with Kristi King, a girls' hockey coach who started at Centennial, joined the college ranks at the University of St. Thomas and is now in her first year at the Blake School.
Pauly and Star Tribune high school sports reporter David La Vaque discuss his team's current win streak and reflect on 10 years since Jack Jablonski's catastrophic injury.
Star Tribune prep sports reporters David La Vaque and Jim Paulsen get high school sports fans caught up on chaos in the hockey rankings, basketball players and teams to watch and even a little football news.
Star Tribune preps reporters Jim Paulsen and David La Vaque recap the biggest names signing their college football letters of intent. Jim discusses an already lively basketball season. And both guys reminisce on great 2021 moments.
Star Tribune preps reporters David La Vaque and Jim Paulsen recover from post-Prep Bowl depression by discussing all things boys' hockey.
Star Tribune reporters David La Vaque and Jim Paulsen share their picks for the final football games this season taking place Friday and Saturday at U.S. Bank Stadium
Star Tribune prep sports reporters David La Vaque and Jim Paulsen also look back on the rollicking volleyball state tournament and ahead to girls' hockey dropping the puck on a season full of intrigue
Star Tribune reporters David La Vaque and Jim Paulsen take a deeper look at exciting state tournament teams and matchups in volleyball and football.
You want cross-country, football, soccer and volleyball insights? Star Tribune preps reporters David LaVaque and Jim Paulsen have you (and the landscape) covered.
Star Tribune preps reporters David La Vaque and Jim Paulsen review the wealth of football playoff upsets and discuss the Class 6A experiment pitting the tradition-rich programs against those trying to rebuild.
To QRF or not to QRF? Star Tribune preps reporters David La Vaque and Jim Paulsen tackle the imperfect and sometimes "bloody" process of seeding football teams.
Katie Aafedt, the Edina girls' coach, and Aaron Fenton with the Lakeville South boys' program, talk all things soccer with Star Tribune reporter David La Vaque.
Star Tribune prep sports reporters David La Vaque and Jim Paulsen debate how to best rank a football team. They also give props to a courageous tennis player, and the architect of Eden Prairie's football program.
Star Tribune's David LaVaque and Jim Paulsen talk running backs used more in the passing game and the stadiums where the Friday Night Lights shine brightest
High school writes David La Vaque and Jim Paulsen take you inside the game as they try to unravel what they know and don't know about the Minnesota high school football season.
St. Thomas Academy and Cretin-Derham Hall clash once again, as Jim Paulsen and David La Vaque discuss in their second Taking Preps episode of fall 2021.
David La Vaque and Jim Paulsen talk about a 2021 season that begins with a feeling of normalcy.
A season that begin haltingly last fall and ground to halt in the winter finished up with spring sports state tournaments featuring clutch performances, cool story lines and a sense of, dare we say, normalcy that bodes well for next year, according to the Star Tribune's Jim Paulsen and David la Vaque.
A sweltering week of boys' tennis offered a preview of what will be a five-sport blizzard of tournaments next week, including a cast of newcomers among the lacrosse final eight boys' and girls' teams. Plus what Chet Holmgren's latest honor says about Minnesota high school basketball, from the Star Tribune's David La Vaque and Jim Paulsen.
Controversial boys' hockey coach Mike Randolph steps down amid an investigation, Trejuan Holloman steps up as a possible Gopher, and the Minnesota State High School League is showing financial improvement. The Star Tribune's Jim Paulsen and David La Vaque dissect it all in the latest Talking Preps.
With 50 years of journalism experience between them, the Star Tribune's David La Vaque and Jim Paulsen offer graduation season reflections about covering a sports world full of community, everyday athletes and occasional stars before their time with one common denominator: "Rarely,'' Jim says, "do you get a no-comment.''
The idea was to improve competitive balance starting this fall among the state's largest football programs, where state tournament runs are skewed in favor a minority of teams. But as the Star Tribune's David La Vaque and Jim Paulsen discuss, those efforts have some questioning how much it will help when it comes to always-contentious postseason seeding.
The Star Tribune's Jim Paulsen, under astute questioning from colleague David La Vaque, breaks down how a strongly backed proposal came up a few votes short at a key Minnesota State High School League meeting even as girls' wrestling was approved for a state tournament division.
The Star Tribune's Jim Paulsen and David La Vaque recount superlative efforts across Minnesota high school sports this spring and set up a key meeting to decide whether boys' volleyball and a girls' wrestling state tournament are a go.
The Star Tribune's David La Vaque and Jim Paulsen delve into new guidance that makes mask-wearing optional during games and practices, provide insight into Chet Holmgren's move out west and call out a couple of coaching changes of note in boys' hockey.
After a jam-packed run of championships, the Star Tribune's David La Vaque and Jim Paulsen disclose what stood out for them, including under-appreciated moments, from a just-completed stretch of high school state tournaments.
The Star Tribune's Ron Haggstrom and Jim Paulsen analyze all four classes of boys' and girls' basketball matchups starting Tuesday and wonder if the Bulldogs, shut down by the pandemic on the eve of their title game last year, can make it this time around.
Out of basketball coaching this year but probably not for good, Brian Cosgriff tells the Star Tribune's Jim Paulsen that he misses the game but not the COVID disruptions. And that it will take "the perfect game'' to keep his former team from another Class 4A title.
Always loquacious Ted Cheesebrough, veteran high school hockey coach, dishes to the Star Tribune's David La Vaque what he learned when he quizzed his peers who will behind the bench starting Tuesday at Xcel Energy Center.
Wayzata coach Taylor Williamson shares state tournament insights, who could surprise in quarterfinal games this weekend and what it will take to win it all in a conversation with the Star Tribune's David La Vaque.
The Star Tribune's David La Vaque handicaps the boys' and girls' tournaments as teams navigate through COVID concerns and colleague Jim Paulsen discloses a "pied piper'' of sorts who he thinks could help a new Gophers coach win over local players.
The Star Tribune's David La Vaque and Jim Paulsen talk Gopher in-state football recruiting success, No. 1 Maple Grove falls in boys' hockey, a busted winning streak in girls' basketball and whether attendance restrictions will be loosened at hockey and basketball state tournaments.
The Star Tribune's Jim Paulsen and David La Vaque talk basketball players to root for in Tre Holloman and Will Tschetter, COVID still rippling through winter sports and a girls' basketball battle of teams with long winning streaks.
Staff writers Jim Paulsen and David La Vaque serve up a slightly past midseason snapshot at who they would tap, based on performance to date, for first teams in boys' and girls' basketball and hockey.
The Star Tribune's David La Vaque and Jim Paulsen offer up the best two boys' teams, three girls' teams in the hunt and a nationally televised boys' basketball game that produced a surprise player not named Holmgren or Tschetter.
The football coach talks with the Star Tribune's Jim Paulsen and David La Vaque about community pride in the school alum and Super Bowl champion Johnson, and how the team learned from his one-man 2015 Prep bowl performance to win it all without him the next year.
The Star Tribune's David La Vaque and Jim Paulsen talk through newly approved and highly anticipated plans to hold high school state championships again, some basketball news and offer their take on origins of "nothing to sneeze at.''
Amid the return of Minnesota high school winter sports, the Star Tribune's Jim Paulsen and David La Vaque are seeing an important new meaning being brought to the court, rink and mats that doesn't show up in the box scores.
A 50-point drubbing of a top foe has the Star Tribune's Jim Paulsen and David La Vaque wondering if the Royals, with a 64-game winning streak, will lose a game this year, Plus the latest on state tournaments coming into view,
As high school sports resume Jan. 14 with masks required, Jim Paulsen and David La Vaque get the hockey season started and mix in basketball, wrestling and gymnastics as well.
"Everyone wants the kids to play,'' says the Star Tribune's David La Vaque, who with colleague Jim Paulsen delve into the mask controversy and more with games set to begin Jan. 14.
The Star Tribune's Jim Paulsen and David La Vaque look past the Jan. 4 start date for high school sports practices to when basketball, hockey and other sports will start to compete, and maybe even get to state tournaments.
The Star Tribune's David La Vaque and Jim Paulsen talk all-metro volleyball, look ahead to the college football early signing period starting Wednesday and offer predictions on when high school winter sports will get going again.
The Star Tribune's Jim Paulsen and David La Vaque critique their work picking their All-Metro football teams and the Minnesota State High School League's plan for getting sports back in action.
The Star Tribune's Jim Paulsen and David La Vaque make the case for their favorites in a season that offered no clear answers, call out some personal football highlights and, with the winter season on pause, walk through recent high school league budget news.
In the latest Talking Preps, David La Vaque and Jim Paulsen lament football and volleyball seasons cut short, discuss why it's a four-week break and speculate on what happens after that.
In the latest Talking Preps, David La Vaque and Jim Paulsen celebrate Sam Smith of St. Paul Humboldt and friends Nyle Dickel of Minneapolis Washburn and Nick Flaskamp of Minneapolis Southwest. And look ahead to section brackets unfortunately riddled by COVID absences.
The Star Tribune's David La Vaque and Jim Paulsen talk with Aaron Berndt, a key organizer of races held last weekend to give many of the state's top high school runners, in the absence of a traditional state meet, a chance to compete as teams and individuals.
In the latest Talking Preps, Prep Redzone recruiting analyst Oliver West joins the Star Tribune's Jim Paulsen for a midseason assessment of teams and players making news, including a surprising number leading potent passing attacks in a state best known for running the ball.
In the latest Talking Preps, David La Vaque and Jim Paulsen remember the legendary sports columnist from the preps perspective, break down a big football game Friday and a top recruit from Cooper, talk about an injury to volleyball star Kennedi Orr and hint at a special cross-country postseason event.
In the latest Talking Preps, Jim Paulsen talks about Chisholm basketball's Bob McDonald, David La Vaque recaps a soccer bid to have a state tournament and both get ready for chillier nights of football this week.
In the latest Talking Preps, David La Vaque and Jim Paulsen size football matchups Friday night and preview a volleyball season that serves up its first matches on Thursday.