Paulsen All-State, pitching in All-Star Classic

Kewaunee’s Brett Paulsen has been named 1st team All-State as a pitcher by the Wisconsin Baseball Coaches Association.

That honor came after he was named 1st team All-North East District, something he shared with Gibraltar-Washington Island’s Cam Munao. Receiving All-District honorable mention were Storm seniors Waylon Delain and Connor Kilgore and Algoma junior Charlie Prokash.
Paulsen was the only Packerland player selected for the 41st Wisconsin Baseball Coaches Association’s All-Star Classic, set for this weekend in Oshkosh. He’s one of just 72 players statewide, split into four teams. Paulsen was named to the North All-Stars.

Brett completed his senior season with a 12-0 record, 141 strikeouts and just 11 hits allowed in 63 innings. He started it with 26-2/3 innings of no-hit ball before Prokash broke the ice with a single to center.

Paulsen threw three straight no-hitters early on, becoming only the second pitcher in Wisconsin high school baseball history to do so in the same season. The lefty had five solo no-hitters and a sixth shared with Jackson Walecka. One of the no-hitters was a seven-inning perfect game against Escanaba, in which Paulsen struck out 19 of the 21 batters he faced.

His season-ending earned run average was .667, and batting average against him was a mere .056.

Offensively, Brett led the team in at-bats (98) and hits (41), and tied Delain for the most runs scored (44).

Paulsen will be playing college baseball at UW-Parkside after receiving their offer last summer.

“I really like the staff, and the program direction over the last couple years,” he said. “I didn’t receive any official Division 1 offers. I had a few conversations with coaches, but nothing really materialized in that time frame. Being close to home is important, but ultimately being a Wisconsin kid was the big deal. I really want to represent the state, and they allow me to do that at a high competition level.”

Now that he’s had a couple weeks to digest Kewaunee’s sectional title game loss, Paulsen was asked how he’s feeling.

“I still feel the same way I did right away,” he said. “We had a great year, and everyone knows that. It wasn’t a waste, or all for nothing. Plenty of us will remember almost the whole journey this year.”

Falling short of its goal — a state championship — doesn’t take away the team’s accomplishments. While he would have preferred a second straight trip as a player in the state tournament, Paulsen instead took in the action as a spectator.

In one Division 3 semifinal, Cedar Grove-Belgium beat Marathon — the team that ended Kewaunee’s season — by a score of 13-4. In the other, four-seed Dodgeville upset top-seeded St. Croix Falls, 6-5. Cedar Grove-Belgium then won the title game, 13-9.

“Watching those second games where teams had to compete without their ace was what we expected,” Paulsen said. “That’s where we knew we had an advantage. But we didn’t get it done.”

Kenosha St. Joseph Catholic, the team that edged Kewaunee in the Div. 3 state championship game last year (3-2), moved up to Div. 2. The Lancers beat Waupun 5-3 in a semifinal before losing the championship game to Pewaukee, 5-4.

Kaukauna won the Div. 1 crown, 11-5 over Madison Memorial, and Columbus Catholic won D-4 by an 8-4 score over Potosi/Cassville.