Hawks build houses, chemistry for the holidays

It’s a team-building tradition that has stood for seven years, although one of this year’s gingerbread houses didn’t.

The Grafton High School girls’ basketball team on Dec. 17 again divided into small groups to construct gingerbread houses in a contest that builds camaraderie that carries onto the court.

Ava Dotson and her partner moved to the far corner of the high school commons to avoid anyone stealing their intellectual property in building designs.

“I’m trying my best,” she said as she held up the walls of her structure with both hands. Hers wasn’t the one that collapsed. That one had “help me” printed on it in red sprinkles of various Christmas shapes.

Nobody wanted to miss what has become a favorite team activity. Liliana Verplancke was sick but called in and helped Melanie Morgan and Brynlee Hildebrand design their contraption via FaceTime.

Hildebrand provided one tip on icing she has picked up over the past few years.

“You have to make sure you melt it a little bit so that it spreads enough so you can glue the house together. Otherwise it doesn’t glue together, it just falls,” she said. “We learned that two years ago. Not our first rodeo.”

The Hawks, including everyone in the program from freshmen to seniors, assistant coaches and a few boy athletes who are helping by practicing with the team, had 45 minutes to build a house “that stood up,” coach Matt D’Amato said.

“We tweak it a little bit every year to get it more efficient, more fun and fair. They seem to look forward to it. Sometimes it’s good to get away from the basketball court and just have fun, laugh and enjoy things.”

D’Amato is still surprised each year.

“Nobody brings a pair of scissors to open up the icing, so that’s one thing that still shocks me,” he said.

This year’s winner was a two-story “double ducker” creation courtesy of Kendyl Conrad, Amber Radtke, Claire Wille, Sam Cameranesi and Austin Stern.

“We formed an alliance with two of the seniors from our practice squad and the senior team,” Conrad said.

“We were two separate groups to start so we worked together to collaborate and make a great gingerbread house, so I would have to say teamwork,” she said when asked about the key to their work.

Radtke returned from another location in the cafeteria to add her thoughts about the group’s secret to success.

“Teamwork,” she said.

“That’s what I said!” Conrad said.

“Also believing that it’s not going to fall over,” Radtke added.

“We had positive energy,” Wille said.

Conrad silenced critics of her large group.

“People were nagging on us for going together, saying we should be disqualified, but no. We used our resources. We checked (the rules) first,” she said.

Reporter Mitch Maersch was again drafted to be one of multiple judges this year. No, he wasn’t compensated. Again.