All-Metro Sports Awards: Celebrating a remarkable year of prep thrills

A collection of the metro area's finest high school athletes and coaches, their biggest supporters and the merely curious gathered at Target Field on Tuesday for the first All-Metro Sports Awards, sponsored by the Star Tribune. Clockwise from top left: Eastview dance team members Nina Boguslawski, Tess Matalamaki and Caitlyn Schmitt took advantage of the setting as a selfie backdrop. Wrestlers from St. Michael-Albertville picked up their passes (and, later, a team award). The event's keynote speaker, Vikings receiver Adam Thielen, conducted a Q-and-A with the athletes and remarked, "This is cool for me because I wasn't good enough to get an award like this in high school." Cretin-Derham Hall basketball players Sy Chatman, Daniel Oturu and Ryan Larson, after collaborating to create the year's Sweetest Play, scored again with a hulking box of candy, while Totino-Grace nose guard Luke Kubesh fired a question at Thielen. On page C11, Eden Prairie lacrosse players Kyle McNeill and Kate Pearson squared off in some pre-ceremony cornhole competition. Twins legend Tony Oliva stopped by, too. Top golfers Tristan Nelko of Wayzata, left, and Red Wing's Sophia Yoemans, right, were on hand. Rogers soccer goalkeeper Cassidy Lehrke took a turn at a giant Kerplunk game.