GRCC Earns 1st Final with Size, Surprise
March 23, 2018
By Geoff Kimmerly
Second Half editor
EAST LANSING – Grand Rapids Catholic Central’s victory celebration had a championship feel Friday night.
The Cougars hadn’t locked down their first MHSAA boys basketball title yet. But it was impossible to not understand their heightened excitement.
Leading from start to finish, GRCC eliminated New Haven with a 69-53 Class B Semifinal win at the Breslin Center, in the process ending the reigning champion’s 52-game winning streak.
And if that was at all a surprise, how the Cougars got there was just as stunning.
Junior guard Austin Braun, carrying a 7.8 points-per-game average heading into the week, scored 31 while Mr. Basketball finalist Marcus Bingham, Jr., watched the final five minutes from the bench after fouling out.
“I got a couple buckets early and my teammates just really got me going, just getting me hyped on the bench,” Braun said, “and just telling me, ‘If they don’t stop you, just score the ball.’
“It helps when you have two bigs and Darrell (Belcher) and Devin (Boyd) were great players around me. It just opens up a lot for me.”
Grand Rapids Catholic Central (24-2) will play for that first championship against Benton Harbor at 6:45 p.m. Saturday in the final game of this boys basketball season.
Those bigs – the 6-foot-11 Bingham and 6-8 senior Jacob Polakovich – were plenty effective in a number of ways Friday.
Bingham had 11 points and 13 rebounds, and Polakovich had eight points and eight rebounds. But their larger impact came defensively. Bingham had six blocks, and together the tandem played a significant role in New Haven’s 30-percent shooting from the floor.
The Rockets’ 6-7 junior star Romeo Weems put together a solid line with 20 points, eight rebounds and seven steals. But even he was off his usual sharpness, making only 7 of 25 shots from the floor.
New Haven (26-1) as a team entered the week making 49 percent of its shots, with Weems connecting on 53 percent.
“We adjusted our shots. We saw it on film and we went to attack them,” New Haven coach Tedaro France II said. “We wanted to jump stop and pump fake. (But) they changed our shot selection a lot, disrupted our shots in the paint with some of their size.”
Braun, meanwhile, was just about perfect offensively. He made 8 of 9 shots from the floor, including his lone 3-point try, and 14 of 16 free throw attempts. He also had three assists and three steals.
The first of those steals came between buckets as he scored the game’s first four points. The free throw shooting came in handy at the end, as Braun drilled nine over the final five minutes to help the Cougars extend an 11-point lead to 18 after Bingham’s night was done.
“I knew he could score like that,” Polakovich said. “It’s just always been a matter of having a lot of mismatches inside with me and Marcus and being able to crash. … (But) a lot of people don’t realize he’s capable of doing that every single night. He’s a lot more than just a really great passer.”
Bingham did finish with 11 points despite a tough 3-of-11 shooting night as well, and grabbed 13 rebounds with six blocked shots. Weems was followed by senior guard Tavares Oliver, Jr., with 15 points and senior forward Ashton Sherrell with 12 points and seven rebounds.
PHOTOS: (Top) Grand Rapids Catholic Central’s Marcus Bingham, Jr., gets a hand on Romeo Weems’ shot Friday at the Breslin Center. (Middle) GRCC’s Austin Braun puts up a shot with Ronald Jeffrey III defending.
ATAP Continues Extraordinary Climb By Advancing to 1st Title Game
By
Keith Dunlap
Special for MHSAA.com
March 13, 2025
EAST LANSING – Meteors might only seem like they are limited to the sky, but don’t tell that to the Arts & Technology Academy of Pontiac boys basketball team.
On Thursday, the Lions continued what can be put mildly as a meteoric rise toward the top of the state.
ATAP, which opened in 2001, advanced to its first state championship game with a convincing 76-40 win over Ishpeming Westwood in a Division 3 Semifinal on Thursday.
The Lions went 3-12 two years ago and 8-7 last year, but are 21-1 entering Saturday’s 4:30 p.m. Final.
Playing in a Semifinal for the first time, the Lions showcased to the state why they have climbed so quickly, overmatching Westwood with their speed, skill and athleticism.
For ATAP head coach Orlando Lovejoy, everything was about focusing on his team and its strengths.
“We don’t watch film on nobody,” Lovejoy said. “Why would we even watch film on somebody when we don’t even know how they are going to play us? There’s no need to watch film. The most important thing is to play the way we are going to play and control what we can control, and that’s how we play defense. That’s the main thing we can stop anybody with, our defense.”
ATAP (21-1) certainly displayed its defense, forcing 21 turnovers by Westwood.
Offensively, freshman Lewis Lovejoy led the way with 19 points, while sophomore De’Vontae Grandison had 17 and nine rebounds.
The Lions held a 24-17 rebounding advantage and shot a blistering 70.5 percent from the field (31 of 44), making 29 of 34 shots from 2-point range.
“It feels great because we have put in so much work,” said senior Teyshaun Hicks. “From the summertime to the start of the season, 6 in the morning to late at night. It’s paying off, and you see it now.”
Junior Ethan Marta scored 15 points and senior Tristan Miller added 13 to lead the way for the Patriots (22-6), who made their first Semifinal appearance since 2003.
“We ultimately fell short tonight, but it doesn’t change anything we did all year,” Westwood head coach Luke Gray said. “We set the standard. Graduated seven seniors from last year. These kids embraced it the right way. We had a great summer and I will always cherish the way this team leads by example not only within this program, but in the community with how they treat others.”
The Lions were dominant from the start, scoring the first eight points and forcing the Patriots into two timeouts before the game was even four minutes old.
ATAP had an 18-8 lead after the first quarter before Ishpeming Westwood seemed to settle into the game.
The Patriots cut the lead to 20-14 with 5:05 to play until halftime on a jumper by Miller. But the Lions surged from there, using their pressure defense to create turnovers that led to easy baskets. ATAP finished the second quarter on a 16-1 run to grab a 36-15 lead by halftime.
The Lions ensured there wasn’t a big run by the Patriots during the third quarter, taking a 56-33 lead into the fourth.
PHOTOS (Top) ATAP's De'Vontae Grandison brings the ball upcourt during his team's Semifinal win. (Middle) The Lions' Khalif Stovall (2) works to maintain possession with multiple Westwood players closing in.