BLOOMING PRAIRIE, Minnesota - You've seen them score countless touchdowns and hit three pointers. Blooming Prairie athletics had an amazing year.
But what is an Awesome Blossom? To get the real answer, I traveled to Blooming Prairie to find out from Activities Director Ali Mach.
"Really we are a flower, I mean that's our mascot, we're a giant flower," Mach said.
It's as simples as that, a flower. It's not a brand new, flashy nickname, there's a deep history associated with it.
"The 1900s it was Austin high school kind of named us the 'boys from blossom-town' and then from there it's kind of transitioned into the awesome blossoms. That was in 1979," Mach said.
The Blossoms' colorful nickname has received plenty of attention in the past few weeks. The Minnesota State High School League created a bracket challenge of team mascots. BP is currently in the championship game against the Moorhead Spuds.
John Millea, the man behind the bracket, says he didn't expect this many people to get involved.
"We're past 85,000 votes as we're in the final matchup between the Spuds and the Awesome Blossoms," he said. "It's just gone beyond anything I ever anticipated."
What makes the matchup unique, there are no other schools in the country that have the same name. The Blossoms wouldn't have it any other way.
"It's just really hard to explain unless you're a part of a community like this where you get to see this," Mach said. "We get excited when you know teams make fun of us for being the flowers and then we go and beat them."
BP is trailing to the Spuds by nearly six percent. The winner will be revealed at 11 A.M.
