[Chief Hedgehog]

In every sporting match, nothing goes as planned. No matter the teams involved, no matter the venue.

I will be honest, I was heart-broken for my team, and my alliance after that match. I still am. To watch the match play out - it was heart-wrenching. It still is.

My team is still young - it is only our second year. To be able to compete in the elimination rounds of North Star two years in a row is quite a feat - to be able to have the same alliance two years in a row is unbelievable.

After last season, we knew that we must make a big jump to build off of last year's success. So we decided to make a practice-bot (Betsy) - and everything was working great... We did have major problems early on as we were unable to refit our superstructure to our competition Robot in proper fashion - and we found out that our PWM's were the source of our problems early on. But once everything was firing spot on - we were very dominant.

It breaks my heart to not be able to bring my seniors to St Louis... The role of the coach is not easy - it ends this way for so many. The coach has to live this type of emotional hemorrhage year after year - only a few get to walk away as Champions.

The officials made the call that they deemed best fit for the situation. Everyone can make the perfect calls from hindsight... but the officials have to do so in the moment. I respect the decision that was made - and we move on. And I thank the officials for a doing a great job at the North Star.

Again, I thank all that are involved in making FRC so popular in Minnesota. MN is a great place to build a FRC program - such great pre-season learning opportunities, a great infrastructure, great Inspectors (special thank you to Jon Stratis - you have been awesome the last two years), great volunteers, and great post-season opportunities...

I am grateful to coach in a community that backs us; I cannot thank XCel Energy, LPI, Darter Plastics, SEH, and all of our sponsors enough; I am very thankful for the opportunity to work with great mentors; most of all, I am thankful to work with the best group of students in Minnesota.

I coach my team to look for the opportunities in all situations - and FRC 4607 is hard at work making this year's robot more robust and potent than it was before - we look forward to the off-season events!

Good luck to teams 2177, 3042, and 4778 - I know you will represent MN well! Hopefully we can meet up at the MSHSL Tournament!