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Breslin Bound: Boys Report Week 5

January 14, 2014

By Geoff Kimmerly
Second Half editor

The powerhouse programs often seem to be the same from boys basketball season to season.

But one of the most entertaining parts of high school hoops is how a team can change its level of success substantially from year to year as players move up to varsity and graduate each spring.

The below list of last week's 10 impressive squads includes a number that are off to strong beginnings to 2013-14 after lesser performances a season ago. (Records are based on results reported to the MHSAA Score Center.)

1. Holland (6-0, Class A) – The Dutch finished a game under .500 last season, but have opened by beating some of the best from the state’s west side plus solid Mount Pleasant. 

2, Detroit Henry Ford (6-1, Class B) – The Trojans already are halfway to equaling last season’s win total and have posted some of their most impressive over Ann Arbor Huron and Rockford.

3. Negaunee (7-1, Class C) – The Miners are the only team undefeated in the Mid-Peninsula Athletic Conference after handing rival Ishpeming its first loss of the season, 57-55, last week. 

4. Ann Arbor Huron (5-1, Class A) – The River Rats have jumped out to a nice lead in the Southeastern Conference Red and earned a solid win over Detroit East English during holiday break.

5. Boyne City (6-0, Class C) – Call it clutch; the Lake Michigan Conference-leading Ramblers already have three league wins by five or fewer points. 

6. Rochester Adams (6-1, Class A) – The Highlanders have lost a combined two games over the last two seasons, with this winter’s lone defeat a mere three-pointer during the opening week.

7. Fennville (6-1, Class C) – The Blackhawks are off to their best start of the young decade, with the lone loss a four-pointer to traditional Class D power Wyoming Tri-unity Christian. 

8. Flint Carman-Ainsworth (6-1, Class A) – The Cavaliers have won their first four Saginaw Valley Association South games by an average of 23 points per.

9. Mount Pleasant (5-1, Class A) – Four of those five wins have put the Oilers on top of the always-competitive Saginaw Valley Association North. 

10. Bloomfield Hills (5-1, Class A) – The Black Hawks' first season after emerging from the merge of Lahser and Andover is off to a great start, with the only loss a one-pointer to Rochester and last week’s 13-point win over Southfield-Lathrup most impressive.

PHOTO: Ann Arbor Huron got past East Lansing during the Holiday Hoops Invitational at Michigan State's Breslin Center and is off to a 5-1 start. (Click to see more at HighSchoolSportsScene.com.) 

Erik O. Furseth

In Memoriam: Erik O. Furseth (1930-2022)

By Geoff Kimmerly
MHSAA.com senior editor

March 1, 2022

For 50 years, Erik O. Furseth’s voice chimed throughout MHSAA and Michigan State University athletic events. That voice surely will continue to live in the memories of the many who cherished listening to him, as he died Monday evening at the age of 91.

Furseth began as the public-address voice of MHSAA Boys Basketball Finals in 1968 and continued well into his 80s as those games moved from Jenison Field House to other locations across the Lower Peninsula and eventually settled into Breslin Center. He also was the longtime MHSAA football championship game voice going back to their days at the Pontiac Silverdome and provided the narration for MHSAA Baseball Finals for a decade. He announced his last MHSAA event in 2018.

An MSU basketball player during the early 1950s, the Cleveland Heights, Ohio, native played in the Spartans’ first Big Ten game in 1951. A forestry student initially, Furseth switched to communications. He later became a legendary rock-n-roll radio DJ in Lansing, and for a decade hosted Saturday night dances at the Lansing Civic Center that drew 1,000 teenagers a night – and a surprise performance by a young Stevie Wonder.

Furseth’s voice continued to be known particularly by Spartan fans as the homecourt voice for MSU basketball from 1968-2002 and MSU football from 1971-98. For more, see this feature from the MHSAA Basketball Finals programs written in 2013.

Furseth moved from East Lansing to Traverse City about 25 years ago. Click for his obituary and funeral arrangements.