Cherry School District

Speakers from Bemidji, Cass Lake-Bena, Pequot Lakes, Pillager, Walker, Laporte, Cherry, Mountain Iron-Buhl, Red Lake County, UNC, Staples-Motley and Crookston took home hardware.

The qualifiers span 27 Northern Minnesota teams and all 13 categories. Over 30 are repeat qualifiers, including five medalists and one reigning champion.

Cherry, Pequot Lakes and Red Lake County are repeat qualifiers to the boys basketball state tournament. Grand Rapids is making its first appearance since 2017.

The Native American-led program of the Northland Foundation also funded projects around educational and cultural programming. The grants aim to build community.

Four speakers from three rural Northern Minnesota school districts took first at the state Speech meet last weekend, and 14 more finished in the top eight.

The region will be well represented in the Class A meet, with 69 entries; Northern Minnesota has five entries in the 2A meet.

Three of the top four Class A teams were from Northern Minnesota in the 2025 boys basketball state tournament.

Cherry, Red Lake County, Nevis and Pequot Lakes will compete in the Minnesota State High School League tournament, the last of the winter sports season.