'Iceman' Adds Singles Championship to Durand's History-Making Weekend
By
Jeff Bleiler
Special for MHSAA.com
February 28, 2026
JACKSON – The chant started as soon as Noah Wood’s name was announced as the Division 3 Individual Finals champion.
“He’s a freshman! He’s a freshman!”
It was not news to those who know the Durand High School bowler, but to those who simply witnessed his on-lane achievements this weekend without that context, the fact that he’s only a freshman was astonishing.
A day after helping lead his Railroaders to the Division 3 team championship — the first team Finals title in any sport in school history — Wood added another piece of hardware to the trophy case by taking advantage of the freshly oiled lanes at JAX 60 on Saturday during match play.
“It means a lot,” Wood said. “I definitely wasn’t expecting to get both, but it feels great that we did.”
Wood defeated Olivet senior Michael Fitzner in a two-game championship match, 442-398, with scores of 224 and 218 to Fitzner’s 183 and 215. That followed a 257-258 blitz in the semifinals by Wood, who after an up-and-down qualifying session welcomed the fresh oil for match play.
“It was a mentality,” he said. “It was making spares and then going up and striking when you could. It helps when you get to bowl on fresh, but it was a mentally.”
Wood qualified ninth with a six-game total of 1,229 that included a 267 start but also a 163 finish.
“He didn’t do the best in qualifying,” said coach Nick Wood, who is Noah’s father. “The transition was tough, but he just does what he does. He gets enough. He understands you can’t win it in qualifying, you can only lose it.
“When he got into match play, you put him on fresh lanes, he was like a train today.”
While he enjoyed early leads in his previous matches, Noah Wood found Fitzner tough to shake in the first half of the championship. The pair were tied through the sixth frame of the first game before Fitzner missed back-to-back 10-pins while Wood stayed clean for a 224 finish. An 8-10 split in the ninth brought a ball change from urethane to reactive resin for Fitzner.
Wood carried a 41-pin lead into the second game and gave more than half of it back when he left a 4-6-7-10 split in the third frame. Fitzner, meanwhile, had strikes on five of his first seven deliveries in the game to get Wood’s attention.
After the split in the third, an undaunted Wood crushed the pocket for six straight strikes to seal the win.
“It’s moxie. This kid is unfazed. They call him the Iceman. Nothing fazes him,” Nick Wood said. “Mistakes happen — he’ll be the first to tell you. It’s what you do after the mistake that defines you, and he’s pretty good at defining himself.”
In his first match of the day, Noah Wood shot 279 and 212 to oust Caro senior Cameron Cuddie and then knocked out top seed Carter Ramage in a tight contest 421-413. Ramage, a Croswell-Lexington senior, was unstoppable during qualifying, shooting 1,419 on games of 228, 229, 205, 266, 265 and 226 to secure the top seed by 120 pins.
Wood sidelined Whitehall senior Mason Slaughter in the semifinals with 257-258 after Slaughter had rolled 259-263 in the quarterfinals.
“It gave me all the confidence I needed to get it done,” Wood said of his semifinal victory.
Fitzner qualified 10th with 1,218, then shot 241-221 to beat Ishpeming Westwood senior Roman Yuhas in the first round, scored 185-224 to topple Bronson junior Clayton Shortridge in the quarterfinals and came from behind to squeak past Armada senior Trenton Rogers in the semifinals 386-381.
Fitzner, who lost in the first round last year to eventual state champion Hunter Ross of Almont, was pleased with his showing.
“It was a long grueling day. It was who can pick up spares and who can stay in it mentally longer than physically,” he said. “That’s what bowling comes down to. For me, coming into it, keep the mental game strong for as long as you can and the scores will follow.”
Oxford, Kettering Earn 1st Championships
March 2, 2018
By Keith Dunlap
Special for Second Half
STERLING HEIGHTS – It’s rare when one MHSAA team championship bowling match comes down to the last frame.
But twice on the same day?
That is what will forever make the 2018 Division 1 Finals at Sterling Lanes so unforgettable.
The Oxford girls and Waterford Kettering boys teams both rejoiced in winning their first titles in school history, as both pulled out their matches in the final frame.
Oxford’s girls team outlasted Macomb Dakota, which entered the regular game of the championship match trailing by 26 pins. Dakota rallied and actually was leading in total pins going into the last two bowlers before Oxford’s duo of juniors Megan Armbruster and Claire Sandstrom made sure the reigning runner-up Wildcats wouldn’t lose in the Final two years in a row.
Armbruster bowled two strikes and finished with 27 pins in her 10th frame to set up the last between Sandstrom and Dakota anchor bowler Danielle McBride.
Unfortunately for Dakota, McBride had an unlucky split on her first ball of the 10th frame, leaving three pins and only being able to pick up two of them.
With the door open, Sandstrom bowled a strike and then added nine more pins in her 10th frame to finish off the title for Oxford.
“A weight was lifted off of my shoulders,” Sandstrom said of when she saw McBride’s ball end with a split. “But I had to stay focused on what I was doing and make my shot.”
For Oxford coach JR Lafnear, it was the end of a 13-year quest for a Finals title, one that nearly resulted in a championship last year before the Wildcats fell to powerhouse Davison in the title match.
“That is what propelled them to work so hard over the summer in practice,” Lafnear said. “Shooting spares and corner pins and doing all that stuff. They were here and got a taste of all the excitement. They really wanted to get it done this year.”
Dakota was seeking its second Division 1 title after winning in 2015.
“They battled through a lot of adversity today and could have gotten knocked out several times,” Dakota coach Kevin Wemyss said. “They showed their character today.”
The boys tournament ended in similar dramatic fashion.
Davison held an 11-pin lead over Kettering after the two Baker games, and the match stayed close until the final frame of the regular game.
The last bowler of the match was Kettering junior Hunter Gates, who stepped up needing 14 pins to give his team the title.
Gates firmly got a strike on the first roll to send the Kettering team jumping for joy, and then the celebration officially began on the next ball when Gates knocked down seven pins.
When he did so, he quickly put his hands over his face and wept tears of joy as he was mobbed by teammates.
“I was just trying to stay cool, calm and collected,” Gates said. “Bowl like I know how I do. My teammates had all the faith in the world in me.”
Kettering head coach JR Olerich said he wasn’t sure if Gates knew he needed only four pins on what turned out to be his final ball.
“If he did, it probably would have been a little bit tougher,” Olerich said. “We all knew.”
Kettering achieved a rarity in that it went wire-to-wire for the title.
The Captains finished first out of the qualifying block before beating No. 8 seed Hudsonville by three pins in the quarterfinals (1,285-1,282) and Saline by 39 pins (1,298-1,259) in a semifinal.
Davison qualified as the No. 2 seed before beating Walled Lake Central in the quarterfinals (1,322-1,227) and Macomb L’Anse Creuse North in the semifinals (1,403-1,335).
Davison was trying to carry the torch at the Finals for the powerhouse girls program, which failed to qualify for the tournament after winning it five of the previous six years.
This was the first time the boys team advanced to the championship match.
“We graduated four starters from last year, so we were really looking at this as a rebuilding year,” Davison coach Robert Tubbs said. “But we went into Regionals and we won the Regional, and we came in here and qualified second. We looked at it as house money. It’s hard for those guys to take it on the chin and say you were four pins from a state championship. These guys, they are not my best average team in my 14 years, but they got more heart, more grit and more determination than any other team I have coached.”
The Oxford girls finished second out of the qualifying block and then earned wins over Saginaw Heritage (1,223-1,207) in the quarterfinals and Holt (1,193-1,152) in the semifinals.
Dakota qualified fifth and then beat Bay City Western (1,164-1,119) in the quarterfinals and No. 1-seed Jenison (1,330-1,157) in the semifinals.