Cedarville/DeTour, Marquette Sweep Finals Wins, Rudyard Reigns with Tie-Breaker
By
John Vrancic
Special for MHSAA.com
October 25, 2026
HOUGHTON — The race for the Division 2 team title race was as close as could be at Saturday’s Upper Peninsula Boys Cross Country Finals.
Rudyard and Munising both scored 42 points, with the Bulldogs from the Eastern U.P. getting the nod on the sixth runner tie-breaker.
Painesdale Jeffers, which won Division 2 titles the past five years, placed third this time with 50 points.
“Our boys have been runner-up to Jeffers the past two years,” Rudyard coach Brad Hall said. “It feels great to win this one.”
Ishpeming senior Kemper Gearhart crossed the finish line first after covering the hilly 3.1-mile course in 17 minutes, 48.2 seconds on the Michigan Tech Ski Trails on a sunny and very warm day in the Copper Country.
“I’ve been working hard for this throughout my high school career,” he said. “I was listening behind me. When I heard people in back of me, I just picked up the pace. My time was about the same as many of the other races. This course was a little more challenging than most.”
Rudyard senior Eli Folkersma was runner-up (18:00.7) and Munising senior Blake Lakosky placed third (18:10.1)
“This wasn’t my best time, but it’s a tough course,” Folkersma said. “My goal was to go out easy. I have a strong finish, but today I was dead tired in the end – although, this is the best place I ever got at the Finals.”
Sophomore Jack Lalone finished eighth, senior Zaine Nichols ninth, senior Oliver Dankert 13th and sophomore Liam Hoolsema 15th for Rudyard. Junior Bryce Mitchell clinched the title with a 19th place as the tie-breaker, as Munising’s sixth runner finished 22nd.
Freshman Evan Kelto finished seventh, with seniors Orin Shalom (11th), Nolan Dolaskie (12th) and sophomore Dylan Krause (14th) also following Lakosky for Munising.
Lakosky was happy with the Mustangs taking second.
“It feels good to be runner-up,” he said. “We knew it was going to be close. I was staying with their number one runner (Folkersma). I fell significantly behind him, then I closed the gap. It was a tough course. I ran my personal-best time (18:01) at Rudyard last weekend. I was going for it, but this was not the course for it.”
Division 3
Nine points separated the top four contenders in Division 3 with Cedarville/DeTour taking its first title as a combined program with 78 points. Cedarville had won Finals in 2003 and 2004.
The Islanders also had the individual champion, senior Ethan Snyder, who retained his title at 16:51.4. Freshman Liam Bohn was third, junior Rush Hinnen 16th, freshman Colin Geyer 27th and sophomore Jayden Kemink 58th.
“This was my last high school race,” Snyder said. “I’m happy with defending my title, but it’s way better winning as a team. We have a lot of good runners on our team.”
St. Ignace and Rapid River scored 86 points each and Rock Mid Peninsula took fourth at 87.
“It was a tight race with St. Ignace and Mid Pen,” Rapid River coach Zach Truitt said. “It really came down to the last tenth of a mile. We had the most finishers in the top 15. We got three on the podium, but we really need four to win it. We’re losing four seniors who will be hard to replace.”
Engadine junior Nate Stielstra was the individual runner-up at 17:58.2 with Islanders freshman Liam Bohn taking third (18:02.4).
“The course was hard,” Stielstra said. “I was running sixth in the second mile. This wasn’t my best time, but everything came together. At 1½ miles I could see a couple kids ahead of me. I couldn’t ask for better.”
Division 1
Marquette, as expected, was crowned champion for the eighth consecutive year with 19 points.
The Sentinels, who grabbed four of the top five individual places, were followed by Sault Ste. Marie with 79 and Houghton at 84.
Marquette senior Lucas Ballard earned his first U.P. title in 16:28.9 followed by classmate Vasu Esplin (17:08.1) and junior teammate William Lindsay (17:23.8) in second and third, respectively. Junior Garrett Crimmins ran fifth and junior Lake Skytta eighth to round out the scoring, and senior Welly Fillmore (13th) and junior Jayden Seekie (14th) also filled out the lineup impressively.
“I felt real good through the whole run,” Ballard said a day after his 18th birthday. “It’s a beautiful day and a great way to end the season. I’m pretty happy with my time. I did a lot of training. It’s great to see my hard work pay off. This is a great birthday present.”
PHOTOS (Top) Brimley's Darren Johnson (134), Munising's Blake Lakosky (177), Ishpeming's Kemper Gearhart (166), and Rudyard's Eli Folkersma (210) lead the start of the Upper Peninsula Division 2 Final held on the campus of Michigan Tech in Houghton. (Middle) Cedarville's Ethan Snyder and Copper Island Academy's Jack Ruonavaara lead the beginning of the Division 3 Final. (Below) Menominee's Bradley Klann (85), Marquette's Lucas Ballard (69), Ishpeming Westwood's Calvin Carlson (41), Calumet's Alex Rodriguez (2) and Sault Ste. Marie's Chase Aldridge (115) set the pace at the start in Division 1. (Photos by Cara Kamps/RunMichigan.com.)
Hansen Goes Distance Again, Allendale Claims 1st Final Since 1999
November 2, 2024
BROOKLYN — It looked like TJ Hansen of Freeland had gotten a big head start on the rest of the field, not that he needed it.
Hansen, after all, set the MHSAA Lower Peninsula Division 2 Finals record with his time of 14 minutes, 52.8 seconds last year.
But here he was, moments before the start of Saturday’s Division 2 race at Michigan International Speedway, nearly in a dead sprint 600 yards from the start rushing into the Freeland tent to quickly change his shorts.
The style of shorts Hansen was wearing differed from those of his teammates, a uniform violation that would have disqualified the reigning champion. After frantically rushing to get different shorts, Hansen was put in a cart and rushed to the start line.
There was no time to decompress.
“As soon as I got back, it was 10 seconds and, boom, the gun went off,” he said. “It’s just a lesson in dealing with adversity.”
For a few highly-stressful minutes, Hansen feared he would be on the sideline while someone else won a championship he was out to defend.
“It kind of flashes before your eyes,” he said. “They tell you you’re DQ’d, and all those months of hard work seem like they flash before your eyes and all go to waste.”
When the gun went off, Hansen was back in his element and repeated as champion by lowering his Division 2 record to 14:50.5, the fourth-fastest time in any division at MIS.
He needed every bit of that effort, as Marshall senior Jack Bidwell took second in 14:57.3, a time that is the third-fastest by a Division 2 runner and 14th all-time in any division.
Hansen and Bidwell reached the two-mile mark together in 9:36.2 before the defending champion pulled away in the final mile.
“It was really just try to push the pace and see how fast I could go,” Hansen said. “My legs weren’t really feeling it today, so I changed up strategy to race to win.”
Hansen won 11 of 12 races this year, losing only to a runner from Tennessee on Oct. 5 in Indiana.
In the team race, Allendale won its first MHSAA Finals championship since 1999 by placing its five scoring runners among the top 29. The top 30 made all-state. The Falcons scored 78 points to win by 102 over 2023 champion Ada Forest Hills Eastern.
Sophomore Mason Hill was ninth in 15:24.0, senior Kilian Whalen 13th in 15:28.8, junior Ronnie Silveira 15th in 15:31.1, senior Ben Gross 27th in 15:47.1 and senior Parker Tiethof 29th in 15:48.3.
Allendale was fourth last year and returned its top six runners.
PHOTOS (Top) Freeland’s TJ Hansen pushes to the finish line in the Division 2 race Saturday after looking back to see Marshall’s Jack Bidwell also on the home stretch. (Middle) Allendale’s Mason Hill (403) and New Boston Huron’s Lucas Kuhn (530) race among the lead packs. (Click for more from Dave McCauley/RunMichigan.com.)