Local players sharing all-star spotlight

For a night, two local girls basketball players from opposing high schools will share an all-star spotlight as teammates.

Indian Creek senior Candace Danz and Center Grove senior Lauren Rau will play for the north team in Sunday’s 28th Annual North/South Indiana All-Star Classic at Vincennes University.

Part of a boys/girls doubleheader, the girls game is at 2 p.m. The boys game follows at 4 p.m.

Danz, the Daily Journal’s 2015-16 Johnson County Player of the Year, averaged team-highs of 17 points, 6.2 rebounds, 3.7 assists and 2.7 steals per game for Indian Creek.

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A Marian University recruit, she finished her high school career with 1,650 points.

Rau, a first-team member of the Daily Journal’s All-County Team, averaged team-highs of 14 points, 4.4 assists and 2.0 steals per game for Center Grove.

A versatile point guard, Rau is a Lipscomb University recruit.

Grizzlies go green

For the second straight year, a host of Franklin College athletes are teaming up for a good cause.On Saturday, they will help plant 250 trees between the Indiana Masonic Home and Greenlawn Cemetery, a low-lying area in Franklin that was damaged by the great flood of 2008.

The tree-planting is part of an effort, conceived by Franklin resident Jim Crane, to convert the area from residential space into a nature park.

Players from the college’s men’s and women’s sports teams will work in pairs planting the trees.

Work begins at 9 a.m.

“Our student-athletes really enjoyed this project last spring, and they are looking forward to pitching in again this weekend,” Franklin college athletics director Kerry Prather said. “We have great respect for Jim Crane, whose vision created the project of rejuvenating this part of the city after the devastating floods of several years ago.

“The Grizzlies are happy to support his efforts by providing the manpower and woman power to plant more trees each spring.”

She’s a hit

For the second time this season, Franklin College senior Katie Struewing has been named the Heartland Collegiate Athletic Conference Softball Hitter of the Week.A Greenwood graduate, Struewing hit .611 during a four-game stretch in which Grizzlies swept doubleheaders against Manchester University and Wilmington College.

In total, she had three doubles, a triple, a home run, eight RBIs and scored eight runs with a 1.056 slugging percentage. The Grizzlies scored a combined 60 runs in the four games.

On March 20, Zachary competed in the Indiana State gymnastics meet. Highlights included finishing first on floor exercise and vault, second on hi-bar and third on rings and all-around.

On April 15, Zachary competed in the Region V championships (Indiana, Illinois, Ohio, Michigan and Kentucky) that were conducted on the Ohio State University campus. Highlights included finishing first on floor exercise and vault (setting personal bests in both), eighth on rings and seventh in the all-around (his all-around score was also a personal best).

Tumbling in

Zach Peters, a junior at Center Grove High School, competed in the Region V Gymnastics Championships on April 15 at Ohio State University.Peters won the floor exercise and vault, and finished eighth in the still rings and seventh in the all-around.

Peters will competed in the May 4 through 7 Junior Olympic National Championships in Battle Creek Michigan.