Clutch Seniors Lead Hackett Title Pursuit
By
Pam Shebest
Special for MHSAA.com
May 21, 2018
KALAMAZOO — A couple of summers ago, Joe Carr caught his last baseball game.
Or so he thought.
The Kalamazoo Hackett Catholic Prep senior was called to action behind the plate during his team’s 12-1 victory against Brown City on May 5, making Carr the perfect utility player for coach Jesse Brown’s Irish.
Over the past two years, Carr has played all nine positions.
Carr is one of just four seniors winding up varsity careers as the team prepares for MHSAA District play next week. The Irish are 26-3 so far this season and ranked No. 1 in Division 4.
Carr actually had to borrow teammate Garrett Warner’s catcher’s equipment to complete the cycle.
The last time Carr had caught was the summer of his freshman year with the HBF Maroons travel team.
“It was the last game of the season, and I finished the game and I turned to my dad and said I’m never catching again,” Carr recalled.
“And then I did. I do enjoy catching. It’s a very fun and very demanding position. I do like that. It’s just that every weekend we have three games and (I would be) catching two of the three games.”
Carr played seven positions last year then added first base and catcher this spring.
‘He kind of struggled with that (utility) role for a little bit from the point that he’s a shortstop by trade, and that’s the position he wants to play,” Brown said. “But he sacrificed it for the team.
“He finished off his true utility mentality. He was (an) all-district, all-region utility player last year and brings a lot of leadership. He’s one of those kids who comes up big in clutch situations.”
More clutch performers
The shortstop position was taken by current senior Cooper Smith two years ago when his family moved to town from the Detroit area after his father, Jay Smith, was hired by Kalamazoo College.
“Cooper is a fiery kid who is very, very competitive,” Brown said. “He’s one of the hardest working kids that I’ve had in my program in the last 13 years. He comes every day to work hard. He’s always getting in extra cuts, extra at-bats, extra ground balls.”
Although he can pitch and play second base, Smith feels at home at shortstop.
“There’s a lot of action and you’re involved in a lot of plays,” he said. “You’ve got to be able to handle some of the pressure and adversity that comes with it.”
Senior Brenden Warner is one of seven players who also competed for the Brown-coached Kalamazoo United football team, a co-op with Kalamazoo Christian in the fall.
For three years, Warner was the team’s punter — he had a broken arm during his freshman football season.
During his four-year baseball career, the outfielder has made just two errors.
“One error was this year when he got caught in the sun on a line drive that hit off the palm of his glove and he dropped it out in left, but he actually threw the guy out at second base,” Brown said.
“So yes, it was an error at first but the runner actually got thrown out at second so he got a put-out off it.”
Warner, a three-time baseball all-stater, also had an error as a sophomore.
He could not decide which sport he wanted to play in college, so when Division III Trine University offered a chance to play both, he grabbed it.
“Me not being active in college would make me feel bad, or sad, not to be doing anything,” he said. “I want to maintain being busy all the time with both academics and sports.”
Warner also leads the baseball team in hitting with a .568 average this season, and has hit .438 for his career.
He credits his hitting prowess with “not thinking about it or letting things get to your head,” he said. “Once I get out, I just let it go. Also, training helps a lot.”
Keaton Ashby, the fourth senior, was also a first-team all-stater last year.
“Keaton is a very passionate baseball player,” Brown said. “He gets the team fired up. When we need that extra motivation, sometimes they get sick of hearing it from Coach Brown and they have to lean on a player for that, and that player is Keaton Ashby.
“He’s batted in the 4-spot his entire career, and his batting average is just over .400 this year and about .390 career. He drives in runs for us, and he’s our leading RBI-getter the last three years.”
Ashby knew baseball was definitely in his future as a young seventh grader when he played on an offseason team with members of the varsity and hit opposing pitchers throwing in the mid-80s.
Ashby usually pitches or plays first base and drove in the winning run on a line drive to left field in the team’s walk-off win against Grand Rapids West Catholic on April 21 at Fifth Third Ballpark.
“I will never forget that,” he said. “It’s a minor league field and many of those guys started out my age on that field.
“Knowing I was on the same field as they were, it was just awesome.”
Holding on to the top spot
In his 13 years as the Irish head coach, Brown has compiled a 285-109 record. Last season Hackett won its District before falling in a Regional Semifinal to St. Joseph Lake Michigan Catholic.
“This group has been at the top before,” he said. “We were at the top last year for about three weeks at the beginning of the season and then finished the season at No. 3 in the rankings.
“This group of seniors and a few juniors are very familiar with what it means to be on the Hackett baseball team. They understand they’re going to get everybody’s best every time we play them. It definitely does raise the bar, but this group has been very humble and willing to accept that.”
Brown said this team’s strength is hitting and defense, but “we don’t have a defined No. 1 pitcher.
“The last several years we had Adam Wheaton (now at Trine) who was a very clear cut ‘This is the guy we’re going to roll out in key situations.’ We don’t have that this year.”
Brown said it has been fun watching the young guys step up, including three freshmen varsity starters in Stephen Kwapis at third base, Steven Widger in right field and Sam Shea, a left-handed pitcher who had the walkoff game-winning hit against Flint Powers Catholic in the other game at Fifth Third Ballpark last month.
Sophomore Garrett Warner has caught every inning this season except Carr’s five behind the plate.
Two players, juniors Heath Baldwin and Eric Wenzel, also run track.
“Eric’s been just huge for us in the top of our lineup and playing center field,” Brown said. “Heath has been at the top of the rotation for pitching.”
The two other juniors, Andrew Widger and Andrew Bridenstine also have contributed.
“Andrew Widger has been our most efficient pitcher,” Brown said. “He’s been coming in in relief and closing out some games for us in big situations.
“Andrew Bridenstine has been key for us. He’s come up with some big hits for us and plays first base when Keaton pitches for us.”
Pam Shebest served as a sportswriter at the Kalamazoo Gazette from 1985-2009 after 11 years part-time with the Gazette while teaching French and English at White Pigeon High School. She can be reached at [email protected] with story ideas for Calhoun, Kalamazoo and Van Buren counties.
PHOTOS: (Top) Kalamazoo Hackett’s Brendan Warner powers through a pitch against Schoolcraft during an April doubleheader. (Middle) Clockwise, from top left: Keaton Ashby, Joe Carr, Cooper Smith and Warner. (Below) Hackett coach Jesse Brown. (Action shot courtesy of JoeInsider.com; head shots by Pam Shebest.)
Performance: Summerfield's Derek Clark
June 20, 2019
Derek Clark
Petersburg Summerfield junior – Baseball
The Bulldogs closed one of the most dominating runs in MHSAA Baseball Tournament history with their first championship Saturday, and Clark turned in a performance to match. The pitcher/centerfielder threw a four-hit shutout in the 9-0 Division 4 Final win over Saginaw Nouvel, capping a run of 44 straight scoreless innings pitched to close his junior season as he earned the MHSAA “Performance of the Week.”
Clark’s pitching statistics this spring were jaw-dropping. He finished 13-0 with a 0.20 ERA – good for seventh lowest in MHSAA history. He had 116 strikeouts in 70 innings pitched, with 11 strikeouts in the championship game including for the season’s final out. He was 4-for-7 from the plate over the Semifinal and championship games to push his average to .500 for this spring, and he also finished with 48 runs scored and 52 stolen bases (tied for 19th most) on 54 attempts over 32 games. Summerfield defeated Gaylord St. Mary 5-0 in the Semifinal on the way to meeting Nouvel on Saturday, and finished with a combined scoring margin of 89-2 over eight postseason games. The championship was the school’s first at the Finals level in any boys sport. The Bulldogs also won the Tri-County Conference and finished 28-4 overall, capping a complete program turnaround – more on that below.
A three-sport athlete as a junior, Clark doesn’t plan to play football as a senior but will return as the point guard for a basketball team that won the league this past winter for the first time since 2011-12. He’s also a 3.6 student, part of National Honor Society and student council, and is leaning toward studying business or sports marketing when high school is done. He should have some interesting options to continue on the diamond as well – the left-hander made the Division 4 all-state first team this spring as a pitcher after earning the same as an outfielder in 2018.
Coach Travis Pant said: “He’s an ultra competitor. He hates to lose, and it shows in the way he plays the game. Derek’s energy and leadership fueled this historic weekend that we had as a program. He’s a humble leader who brings an enthusiasm to the field every single day that is unmatched. What people saw this weekend in the Finals is what I have watched for the past three seasons. He plays the game the right way and is very fun to watch. … He has been the face of the rebuild we had at Summerfield. When he was an eighth grader, we went 6-28. In his freshman year he quickly became the ace and a leader in the dugout. We have won at least 21 games in every year since. Derek has pitched us to two District championships, two Regional championships and a state championship. He wants the ball in big games and the team fuels off his confidence. … Derek’s junior season was nothing short of amazing. He broke the county record for ERA with a 0.20 and was within three of the county stolen base record with 52. To do what he does on the mound and at the plate for us at such a consistent rate is amazing. Derek never had a bad day on the mound. No matter what the situation, he showed up with his best stuff.”
Performance Point: “The community's been really great about it. I can't go anywhere without having somebody say congratulations. I've had people I've never seen in my life say ‘Congrats,’” Clark said. “It's really nice to have that back-up, so to say, with our community. … With the weekend, it was just so good. All of our hard work, it finally paid off, finally got (us) to our number one goal. It's really nice to accomplish something this big. … The last out, to strike him out for the game, I was telling my catcher, ‘If we get to two outs, we've got to strike him out.’ I think that was probably the best moment. I just felt like it was more ecstatic, had us all pumped up. Because we had the confidence, I don't think it was shocking, so to say. We were really confident in ourselves and in our play because we were playing really well at the time. I think it was just more of a relief.”
Talking turnaround: “I think it’s just having guys that can play. The junior class this year was really big. We started five freshmen my freshman year. So just having that, and having guys come out. Also just having confidence in each other and trusting in each other, because team chemistry is huge. If you don’t have that, talent doesn’t really mean anything. … We’ve always been a baseball group. There’s been football and basketball, but we’ve been more of a baseball grade. I think we’ve been all right coming up, and we’ve just hit a stride the last couple of years and (we’re) just getting better.”
Taking the lead: “I just try to be a leader of everything, every sport I play. When it comes to basketball, I'm the point guard so you've gotta communicate, you've gotta use your words, you can't be quiet. You're the general of the floor – you've got to know what to do, what's going on at all times. That's kinda how I am with baseball. I just try to keep everybody engaged and try to get everybody looks and help everybody as much as I can.”
Title time: “It's just great to finally get it done. Our baseball program, Coach (Darrell) Polter built it up (before retiring in 2014 after nearly 40 seasons). He has 17 league titles at Summerfield, and just to finally get that state title meant a lot to us. Nobody's really ever been there to do that, in any sport, so (the community) made a really big deal. We came home after we won, and there was a big parade in town and it was just really surreal and awesome to be a part of.”
Never stop competing: “I think we're all just so competitive. We'll be in math class, doing something that's competitive, and if you lose it's hectic. Nobody wants to lose. I think that's got something to do with (our success). When we grew up, we didn't want to lose ever. That's how we've been since we were little. Some kids take it even into school, like ‘Ha ha, I have better grades than you.’ It gets wild. I’m not bad (academically), but our shortstop Brendan Dafoe has a 4-point, and Brayden Jewell has a 3.8 or 3.9 or something like that. We’re all in advanced class, so we get after each other in there.”
- Geoff Kimmerly, Second Half editor
Past 2018-19 honorees
June 13: Audrey Whiteside, East Grand Rapids lacrosse - Read
June 6: Kari Miller, Ann Arbor Pioneer tennis - Read
May 23: Keshaun Harris, Lansing Waverly track & field - Read
May 16: Gabbie Sherman, Millington softball - Read
May 9: Nathan Taylor, Muskegon Mona Shores golf - Read
May 2: Ally Gaunt, New Baltimore Anchor Bay soccer - Read
April 25: Kali Heivilin, Three Rivers softball - Read
March 28: Rickea Jackson, Detroit Edison basketball - Read
March 21: Noah Wiswary, Hudsonville Unity Christian basketball - Read
March 14: Cam Peel, Spring Lake swimming - Read
March 7: Jordan Hamdan, Hudson wrestling - Read
February 28: Kevon Davenport, Detroit Catholic Central wrestling - Read
February 21: Reagan Olli, Gaylord skiing - Read
February 14: Jake Stevenson, Traverse City Bay Reps hockey - Read
February 7: Molly Davis, Midland Dow basketball - Read
January 31: Chris DeRocher, Alpena basketball - Read
January 24: Imari Blond, Flint Kearsley bowling - Read
January 17: William Dunn, Quincy basketball - Read
November 29: Dequan Finn, Detroit Martin Luther King football - Read
November 22: Paige Briggs, Lake Orion volleyball - Read
November 15: Hunter Nowak, Morrice football - Read
November 8: Jon Dougherty, Detroit Country Day soccer - Read
November 1: Jordan Stump, Camden-Frontier volleyball - Read
October 25: Danielle Staskowski, Pontiac Notre Dame Prep golf - Read
October 18: Adam Bruce, Gladstone cross country - Read
October 11: Ericka VanderLende, Rockford cross country - Read
October 4: Kobe Clark, Schoolcraft football - Read
September 27: Jonathan Kliewer, Grand Rapids Forest Hills Northern soccer - Read
September 20: Kiera Lasky, Bronson volleyball - Read
September 13: Judy Rector, Hanover-Horton cross country - Read
PHOTOS: (Top) Petersburg Summerfield's Derek Clark unloads a pitch during Saturday's Division 4 championship game win at McLane Stadium. (Middle) Clark heads back to his dugout after sliding in head-first to score in Friday's Semifinal.