Woodhaven, GP South Slug to Semifinal Wins
By
Tom Markowski
Special for Second Half
June 14, 2018
EAST LANSING – The best season in Brownstown Woodhaven’s history just got better.
Woodhaven, which had never won a District baseball title before this spring, defeated perennial powerhouse Birmingham Brother Rice 7-3 in a MHSAA Division 1 Semifinal on Thursday at McLane Stadium on Michigan State’s campus.
Colin Czajkowski’s two-run homer broke a 1-1 tie in the third inning, and senior lefthander Drew Szczepaniak allowed five hits in 6 2/3 innings and survived a bases-loaded situation in the top of the fifth to earn the victory.
Woodhaven set a state record earlier this season when it recorded 60 consecutive scoreless innings, which included eight consecutive shutouts. The pitching staff has continued to compete at a high level in the tournament, allowing 12 runs over seven games.
But, defensively, Woodhaven had its difficulties Thursday. The Warriors committed four errors, two in the fifth inning and two in the sixth. The two in the sixth led to Brother Rice’s only run. The two in the fifth helped Brother Rice load the bases with two outs. Szczepaniak got the last out on a pop up to third basemen Zach Biggs.
“In a game like this, you have to put (the errors) aside,” Szczepaniak said. “In the end, if you dwell on it, it won’t do you any good. Yes, I had to stay patient.
“Hey, we’re Woodhaven. We hadn’t won a District until this year. Everything is going so fast, and we’re just trying to take it one day at a time.”
Czajkowski agreed. No one expected Woodhaven to be in a Semifinal let alone the Division 1 championship game, so this is all new.
“We just got to keep level-headed,” he said. “That home run, things were definitely different. Definitely, beating a team like Rice is something special.”
Saturday’s Final, for just the second time in Division 1/Class A history, will feature two teams from Wayne County as Woodhaven (34-5) will play Grosse Pointe South (32-12) at 11:30 a.m.
The other time two Wayne County teams played for the title was in 2006, when Grosse Pointe North defeated Detroit U-D Jesuit 7-5.
To Woodhaven coach Corey Farner, it didn’t matter whom his team was playing Thursday. After all, this is Woodhaven. There isn’t anything with which to compare what his team and the community are going through.
“I didn’t care who we played,” Farner said. “They have a storied history. We’re Woodhaven. We’re not supposed to be here.
“That home run was huge. It was a 1-1 game at that time. It’s someone different every game coming through.”
Woodhaven could be without starting catcher Justin Charron in the Final. As he stopped at second base after batting in a run with a double, he slid awkwardly and left the game. Farner confirmed that Charron injured his right ankle, and his status for Saturday is uncertain.
Carson MacDonell replaced Charron, threw out a base runner attempting to steal and had an RBI single.
Like Farner said, it’s a different player each game.
Brother Rice (31-9), attempting to reach its first Final since 2013, used a handful of pitchers. But it seemed that no matter who coach Bob Riker pitched, Woodhaven’s batter were ready.
“They just out-pitched us,” Riker said. “We just didn’t get that big hit. When we tied it at 1-1, I said, ‘Ok, here we go.’ Then the guy hits that two-run bomb.”
Grosse Pointe South 10, Midland 0
South scored eight runs in the sixth inning of the first Division 1 Semifinal. Nathan Budziak went all six innings on the mound and allowed three hits, no walks and he struck out seven. He’s pitched three shutouts in his three tournament starts and has struck out a combined 29 hitters.
He was in a groove again, and Midland had no answer for him.
“He’s been lights out,” South coach Dan Griesbaum said of Budziak. “Winning 10-0, it’s unreal. We’re hitting over .300 as a team, but we weren’t hitting well early in the season. Maybe it was the weather.”
South had 14 hits paced by Cameron Mallegg with three. Joseph Naporani had three RBI and was one of four players with two hits.
Budziak, and Saturday’s expected starting pitcher, Cameron Shook, both suffered injuries during the season that had each out for a month. Budziak suffered a broken thumb on his left (throwing) hand and returned three weeks ago. Shook suffered a dislocated kneecap and made his first start since his return Tuesday, a 9-1 Quarterfinal victory over Macomb Dakota.
“The other players stepped up after (the two injuries),” Griesbaum said. “It wasn’t just the pitchers. It was a total team effort.”
Saturday’s will be South’s third Final appearance. The Blue Devils won their only title in 2001.
Midland (30-12) used three pitchers. Garrett Willis went the first five innings, giving up four earned runs, and took the loss to finish 10-3 this spring.
VIDEO: Grosse Pointe South tallied eight runs in the sixth inning; here's the two-run single by Giovanny Lutfy that ignited the rally.
PHOTOS: (Top) Brownstown Woodhaven’s Drew Szczepaniak turns on a pitch during Thursday’s Semifinal win over Brother Rice. (Middle) Cameron Mallegg eyes an offering during Grosse Pointe South’s victory.
Kingsley Standouts Big Hits on Diamond, as Friends to 4th-Hour Classmates
By
Tom Spencer
Special for MHSAA.com
April 19, 2024
When Eli Graves or Gavyn Merchant takes a swing this spring for Kingsley, a special group of friends are not worried how they’ll connect with the ball.
That group of friends and classmates — students in Joel Guy’s fourth-hour special education class — feel like the two senior standout athletes already hit a home run at school that day. It might even feel like a grand slam from Graves or perhaps a hole-in-one for Merchant.
And the Kingsley baseball and golf coaches feel similarly – and sentiment that may extend through the entire Kingsley community.
Merchant and Graves are playing their final baseball seasons with Stags. Merchant is dual-sporting, adding golf to his incredible athletic career.
Together, they led the Stags to Division 6 football championship in the fall despite battling through extensive injuries. Graves, the star running back, and Merchant, the outstanding quarterback, then fought through long, hard rehabilitations to get back and lead the Stags on the hardcourt and wrestling mats this winter.
But before stepping up to the plate or the tee to compete for Kingsley on any given day this spring, the pair spend time in Guy’s class and share lunch with the Kingsley cognitively impaired (CI) students.
“You can’t say enough good things about these young men,” said Guy, who also is in his fourth year as the Kingsley golf coach. “I get teary-eyed talking about it – they just kind of took a hold of some of my students making contact at lunch and in the hallway.”
That contact began midway the football season. Graves and Merchant were joined by fellow golfer Ty Morgan and football teammate Skyler Workman.
A few more senior athletes have been a part of the adoption of Guy’s students intermittently as well. But Guy’s students can count on seeing Graves, Merchant, Morgan and Workman in the classroom each and every day and then at lunch. The time was made possible, Guy notes, because the athletes are ahead in their own academic pursuits or participants in the school’s Teacher Academy program.
How those seniors are contributing is rare for accomplished athletes in a high school setting, Guy is happy to point out.
“Gavin and Eli are state champions in football,” said Guy. “They are the stars of their winter sports basketball and wrestling, and you you think that being seniors with those kinds of credentials at lunch they would sit in a table with all their buddies and talk about their accomplishments.
“They sit with my special education students,” Guy continued. “They make my students feel like they’re the ‘in’ crowd, and I am so proud of them.”
Bruce Graves, father of Eli and coach of the Stags’ baseball team, recalls learning from Guy what that group of seniors was doing with their fourth hour. He wasn’t really surprised to hear from someone else what his senior leaders were doing.
“They wouldn’t tell anybody they were doing it,” the 22-year veteran coach said. “They don’t do it for a pat on the back – they just do it because they like being good guys.”
There are various reports of exactly how the athletes started getting involved with the special education students. But everyone in the school located 15 miles south of Traverse City seems happy they did.
Eli Graves, one of the Stags’ five pitchers, roams center field when he’s not on the mound. He is 1-0 as the Stags are off to a 9-0 start following a conference sweep of Kalkaska, 3-0, 15-0, on Thursday. The right-hander is slated to pitch this weekend and has hopes of the Stags finishing the year with a conference baseball title and a deep postseason run.
Graves and Merchant have raised money all year to get birthday and Christmas gifts for their classmates in Guy’s room. They’ve become particularly close to a couple of his students.
“They don’t really see us as helpers or anything like that — they see us more as friends,” said Graves, now playing his third year on the varsity baseball squad. “We go into the special ed room, and basically just help the students with whatever work they are doing.”
After recovering from football injuries, Graves averaged more than 15 points per game this basketball season and earned all-conference. Merchant also recovered from postseason surgeries and got back on the mat to place fourth at 132 pounds in Division 3 and became an all-state wrestler for the fourth time.
The pair’s in-season football injuries were not known to many. They wanted to compete for the state title and tend to the injuries later. Graves rushed for almost 2,000 yards, tying and breaking some of his brother Owen’s school records along the way. He also had 20 tackles, two interceptions and four touchdowns on defense during the 2023 campaign.
Graves sprained a shoulder joint during the Semifinal win over Reed City but a week later carried the ball 33 times and ran for 210 yards in the title game. He had four touchdowns that day in the Stags' 38-24 victory over Almont.
Merchant has had various injuries over the course of his career, undergoing wrist surgery as a sophomore for a carpal tunnel injury and having floating cartilage taken out of a knee following his junior wrestling season.
But what he endured on the way to Ford Field was the topper as he endured two torn ligaments in his knee, a fractured leg, a torn meniscus — and, later on — a pair of broken ribs sustained late in the championship game.
“When you’re in the game, it’s all about adrenaline,” said Merchant, who is facing another surgery in May but shot a 95 to lead Kingsley in its first tournament of the season Thursday at the Frostbite Open in Manton. “You don’t even think about the injury until you get off the field, and that’s when you get ice bags and fight it off.”
They have been close friends since elementary school and credit the Kingsley coaching, teaching and counseling staffs with preparing them for life after graduation.
Graves and Merchant call football their favorite sport. Graves hopes to also play football at the college level, and Merchant expects to continue on the wrestling mat.
Tom Spencer is a longtime MHSAA-registered basketball and soccer official, and former softball and baseball official, and he also has coached in the northern Lower Peninsula area. He previously has written for the Saginaw News, Bay County Sports Page and Midland Daily News. He can be reached at [email protected] with story ideas for Manistee, Wexford, Missaukee, Roscommon, Ogemaw, Iosco, Alcona, Oscoda, Crawford, Kalkaska, Grand Traverse, Benzie, Leelanau, Antrim, Otsego, Montmorency, Alpena, Presque Isle, Cheboygan, Charlevoix and Emmet counties.
PHOTOS (Top) Eli Graves, left, and Gavyn Merchant are among standouts for Kingsley’s baseball team again this spring. (Middle) Merchant (6) hands the ball off to Graves during the Division 6 championship win at Ford Field. (Below) Merchant putts during Thursday’s golf opener. (Baseball photos by Karen Middleton.)