From the Secretary

From the Secretary
by Sheldon Silberman
MSHA Secretary

As always, the 1996-1997 handball season has been a busy year for your Board of Directors and you, the members of the association. The Twin Cities handball scene is filled with opportunities from tournaments and leagues to the Golden Age Society and the Handball Hall of Fame. You can read about most of these events right here in the MSHA Newsletter. We normally publish a newsletter soon after the awards banquet in May. This year, the "staff" got a little too busy so this edition is later than usual - but it is packed with results and other Minnesota handball news!

We have also had an active World Wide Web site for 1-1/2 years. (http://users.aol.com/MNhandball/ MNHANDBALL.HTML) It is the oldest remaining web site on handball in the country! Even before the USHA site. (The first site from Texas is gone.) News from many of the events of the year can be found on this site immediately following the event. The site includes weekly league results, tournament scores and pictures, a calendar of events, past newsletter articles, the hall of fame, and other interesting topics. We even kept daily results on Minnesota players during the Worlds. We've had well over 5,000 visitors to the site. For many, summer sees you deeply involved in family events, vacations and yard work - pushing handball to a lower priority. Others take the sport outdoor for some three-wall fun. You can usually find a dozen or so faithful at the old three-wall courts in Phalen Park in St. Paul on any weekend around noon. Still others found time to travel to Winnipeg to play in the World Handball Championships (see accompanying article.) However, your board has been busy working on bringing the USHA Nationals back to town.

The USHA has changed how they work with the local sponsoring club (that would be the MSHA) since the 1994 event. In 1994 the University of Minnesota and the MSHA jointly sponsored the event and were responsible for funding the entire event. The USHA now provides some of the funding and the local sponsoring club is responsible for providing the athletic facilities and a volunteer staff. We prepared specifications and requested bids from Northwest Clubs and the U of M. NW told us that the Burnsville Club will be renovated with the recent change in ownership and will no longer be suitable to host a national tournament. They suggested a combination of the Highway 100 and France Club and the Moore Lake Club. The U of M has reduced the number of available courts at the Rec Center from 16 to 14 but is building four new glass-back walled courts on the St. Paul Campus. After analyzing the costs and hearing from many of you we have decided to focus our attention on the U of M Rec Center with shuttle service to the St. Paul Campus.

We presented our package to the USHA Board at the June Nationals in Lansing Michigan. We had hoped for 1999 but were given the opportunity to host the 50th annual USHA National Four-wall Handball Championships in 2000.

If we proceed with this prestigious event, we will need volunteer help from all that can help.

The board will meet in a few weeks to discuss our commitment to then 2000 Nationals. If you have an opinion, let one of the board members know. Stay tuned!