ALPENA — The 2008 Alpena High School softball team has been selected by the Alpena Sports Hall of Fame as the 2023 Team of the Year.

The team will be honored at the Hall of Fame’s annual banquet in June.

Members of the 2008 Alpena High softball team include Rachel Brown, Leah Cox, Rachel Gebauer, Alison Keen, Brittney Kirkwood, Aubrey Kowalski, Brandy Lancewicz, Kayla Paczkowski, Kursten Paczkowski, Nikki Preuss, Katie Prevo, Alyssa Smith, and Leah Ventimiglia, along with coaches Paul Marwede, Louie Hoppe, Christin Sobeck, and Jason Barbeau, and Athletic Trainer Brad Nash.

Heading into the postseason with a record of 28-5, the 2008 Alpena High varsity softball team went into districts held at Traverse City West expecting to face Marquette in the district final that Saturday afternoon.

Alpena dismantled Traverse City Central in the district semifinal 16-0 and Marquette defeated Traverse City West to set up a great matchup featuring two teams that had already played four times in the regular season.

Alpena had a 3-1 advantage in those previous games by scores of 2-0, 0-1, 3-0, and 3-2.

Alpena won the district championship by an impressive 8-0.

The following Saturday, Alpena headed to Flushing and came back as regional champions after defeating Midland Dow 2-1 and Flushing 2-0.

On Tuesday, June 10, 2008, Alpena met Rockford at Central Michigan University and came away with a thrilling 2-1 victory in 17 innings.

Rockford’s lead-off hitter homered to start the game, but they never scored again. Alpena tied the score with two outs in the bottom of the seventh and went on to walk it off with back-to-back one-out doubles in the 17th inning.

Battle Creek hosted the Final Four and Alpena faced Howell in the Division 1 state semifinals.

Alpena once again was the home team and fell behind 1-0 in the top of the fifth inning, but answered with five runs of its own in its half of the inning and earned the right to play in the championship game with an impressive 5-1 victory.

In a game played 16 years ago, everyone involved can still remember every play, when Alpena fell to Garden City in 14 innings by a score of 2-1 on that June Saturday.

The team will be honored along with Boosters of the Year Mike Vought and DeAnn Roesner and individual honorees Eric Muszynski, Ashley (Hunalt) Williams, Tony Skiba III, and Nate Barden.