Anchorage Daily News

From polar bears on the prowl at the Barrow football field to the hockey game that got called off because of a rookie Zamboni driver, the weird and the wacky was never too far from Alaska's high school playing fields this year.

And just as you'd expect, some of our weird and wacky had a distinctive far-north flavor:

WHALERS VS. POLAR BEARS:Barrow's second season of football was so successful, the Whalers earned the right to host a playoff game -- prompting some safety concerns about the weather, and even more about the polar bears.

Bears were visiting the top-of-the-world village with frequency this fall. They live on sea ice and will prowl on land if the ice is near the Beaufort Sea shore, where the football field sits. There were reports this year of at least one middle-school practice being cancelled because of multiple bear sightings, and a wildlife photographer shot photos of a bear walking right next to the field, with just a chain link fence separating the two.

But high school athletic director Frankie Arnhart vowed the bears wouldn't interfere with the playoff game. Why so confident? Because when the sea ice is near shore, he would hire gun-carrying maintenance workers to sweep the area clear of bears prior to kickoff. Using rubber bullets, of course.

ZAMBONI 1, BOEKE 0: A hockey game between East and West had to be called after the first period when a rookie Zamboni driver chewed up the ice between periods at Ben Boeke Ice Arena.

"It was just a case of a brand-new, inexperienced Zam driver," said Paul Brauneis, who helps coordinate Cook Inlet Conference hockey. "He dug a hole in the ice that was not repairable and it created unsafe playing conditions."

For about an hour, the teams waited as rink attendants, officials and others tried to fix the damage. "We shoveled in snow, we put water on top, we did all that. We tried everything but it would've taken a couple hours.

"I've been doing this a long time, and that was a first."

Players went home and resumed the game 15 days later. East won 7-1.

THAT'S SERVICE WITH A SIR: It's not often a high school football game inspires a cease fire among soldiers. Then again, it's not often that an offensive coordinator calls plays for the Alaska state football champion game while stationed at an Army base in Kansas.

Fenumiai "Numi" Ilalio Jr., a master sergeant in the Alaska Army National Guard, had to leave the Service High team in mid-season when duty called. He was sent to Fort Riley to prepare for deployment to Afghanistan, and once there, he relied on text messages from his wife to follow the games and phone calls to head coach Jason Caldarera to suggest plays from afar.

The day of the state championship game against Juneau, Ilalio was training with 16 troops, searching for explosive mines, when his wife called to say Service had just taken a 15-14 lead. That news was communicated to Ilalio's commander, who temporarily ended the mission until the end of the game.

"He told us to stop training until Service wins a state championship," Ilalio told the Daily News.

Service came through with a 22-14 victory.

PARTY LIKE IT'S 1982: The Wasilla Warriors' 1982 girls basketball championship got more coverage in 2008 than it did back when the Warriors clinched the title, thanks to Sarah Palin's ascension on the national political scene.

Once Palin became Republican presidential candidate John McCain's running mate, everyone jumped on the Warriors bandwagon. Reporters tracked down former players and coaches and microfilm was searched to find box scores containing Palin's name.

Many reports said Palin was a tournament star for the Warriors, but that was overstated. She scored nine points in three games. But she played on a bum ankle and her coach had to battle to bench her near the end of the championship game

"She was running out of gas on it," said former Wasilla coach Don Teeguarden, who lives in Washington now. "I took her out to get her off of it. She wasn't moving very well on it. She wasn't thrilled about coming out."

OBAMA VS. PALIN, THE REMATCH: Amazing that this little tidbit hasn't been headline news, given that anything remotely related to Palin is.

Wasilla's boys basketball team played in last weekend's Merv Lopes Holiday Classic in Honolulu, where the Warriors played a game against Punahou, a private school in Hawaii.

But this was more than a meeting between team's from the 49th and 50th states. Wasilla is Palin's alma mater. Punahou's is Barack Obama's alma mater.

The game reflected the election. Obama's team won 47-41.

NEXT TIME, DON'T WAIT FOR THE HARPOONERS:Bad weather and power outages made Point Hope a late arrival at this month's Service Cougar Tip Off tournament. The Harpooners were supposed to fly out of Point Hope on Wednesday, but didn't get to Anchorage until Friday.

Ice fog canceled the arrival of the team's flight the first day. Other flights that day didn't have enough seats for the team.

The next day, Frontier Alaska sent a plane from St. Marys, but it arrived after nightfall and it couldn't land either. This time, heavy ice on power lines was the culprit, having caused a village-wide electricity outage that doused the airstrip's runway lights. Too risky to land.

The Harpooners forfeited that day's game against East, went home for the night and returned to the airport the next day. The village was still without power, but planes could land during daylight hours.

But remember, this is Point Hope. In the winter.

Sunup wasn't until 11:32 a.m. The Harpooners' second-round game in the tournament, against host Service, was scheduled to start at 3 p.m. They didn't reach Anchorage until 3:10 p.m., but Service was gracious enough to push the game back to 4:45 p.m.

Next time, the Cougars might not be so accommodating. Point Hope beat its gracious host 67-59.

Find Beth Bragg online at adn.com/contact/bbragg or call 257-4309.

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