De La Salle 3-Peat Adds First-Time Accomplishment to Program's Legacy
By
Keith Dunlap
Special for MHSAA.com
November 7, 2026
GRAND LEDGE — The Warren De La Salle Collegiate boys soccer team talked all season about making more history at Saturday’s Division 2 Final.
Thanks to a 3-2 win over St. Joseph, De La Salle achieved that goal by becoming the first team in the state’s two largest classifications (Class A/Division 1 and Class B/Division 2) to win three straight state championships.
The title also was the program’s eighth overall.
“It means a ton to me because it’s never been done in D1 or D2,” longtime De La Salle head coach Thaier Mukhtar said. “We talked about making history, and they absolutely made history. This was a challenging year for me. I had to take a team that won back-to-back state championships and some way, somehow, find a way to keep them hungry. You have any idea how hard that is?”
De La Salle added to the run thanks to two more goals by the school’s all-time leading goal-scorer and points-earner, senior Andrew Corder, and key contributions from others.
“This one means more to me than the first two combined,” Corder said. “After, I was just bawling my eyes out, which I really didn’t do for the first two. Knowing I played my last game for De La Salle, it sucks. But I went out on a good note.”
The Pilots (21-3-4) also found a way to do what no team had been able to do all year – crack the St. Joseph defense.
The Bears entered having allowed just four goals all year and no more than two in a game, but De La Salle scored three times.
For St. Joseph, it was a tough way to end a special season that saw the Bears advance to the Finals for the first time since finishing Class B runner-up in 1992.
“It’s a legacy,” St. Joseph head coach John Brown said. “Obviously this one game doesn’t define us. They fought until the very end.”
De La Salle took a 2-1 lead with 35 minutes remaining in the game when Corder put in a rebound from in front of the St. Joseph goal after Settimo Leone put a shot on net.
Just 2:10 later, Corder put home another rebound off a shot by sophomore Marco DiLuca to give De La Salle a 3-1 lead.
St. Joseph made it interesting late, cutting the Pilots’ lead to 3-2 with 8:12 remaining on a goal by senior Caden Shannon, who put home a loose ball in the box through a bunch of bodies following a corner kick by senior Evan Hudak.
But the Bears couldn’t get the equalizer, and De La Salle celebrated more history.
“My challenge to them was simply, ‘OK, I nitpicked everything. I corrected all your mistakes. Win or lose, I went back and corrected all your mistakes. I hammered you over and over again,’” Mukhtar said. “I said to them, ‘I needed to get you here. The coaching staff got you here. Now it’s your game. I’m done coaching you. You now go out there and you decide whether you want this game bad enough or not.”
De La Salle opened the scoring with 28:35 left in the first half on a goal by Leone, who jumped on a loose ball in the box in front of the St. Joseph goal and fired it in.
The Bears tied the game with 6:30 remaining in the first half on a goal by senior Remy Kelm, who possessed the ball at the top of the De La Salle box, turned around and fired a shot that bent inside the far post.
PHOTOS (Top) De La Salle’s Andrew Corder sends a shot toward the St. Joseph goal Saturday. (Middle) The Pilots’ Kayden Risch (21) and St. Joseph’s Reece Crawford contend for the ball. (Photos by Adam Sheehan/Hockey Weekly Action Photos.)
Undefeated Fruitport Eying Historic Opportunities as Postseason Begins
By
Tom Kendra
Special for MHSAA.com
October 10, 2024
The hardest thing for Dan Hazekamp is trying to single out individual players on his top-ranked Fruitport soccer team.
“The truth is, what we have here in Fruitport are a bunch of blue-collar guys that go out and play for each other and sacrifice for each other,” explained Hazekamp, whose team wrapped up the outright Ottawa-Kent Conference Silver title on Monday with a 2-0 win over visiting Grandville Calvin Christian.
“We have 24 great individuals. I’m more proud of that than any record.”
Nowhere is that blue-collar mentality more apparent that on the Trojans’ defensive line.
Fruitport, 17-0-1 and ranked No. 1 in the latest Division 2 coaches association poll, had a string of nine straight games without surrendering a goal and is yielding a meager 0.44 per game.
The final line of defense is senior keeper Logan Werschem, whose instincts and experience give the team confidence in pressure situations.
He would be the first to tell you that his defenders excel at limiting scoring chances, making his job much easier. Isaiah Packard, Braxton Ward and Sam Krueger are all seniors and returning defensive starters, along with junior Nathaniel Cribley-Cotto – who has used his 6-foot-2 size to fill the shoes of departed all-stater and four-year starter Brady Brown.
“We carry a lot of pride back there,” said Packard, who hopes to play soccer next year at Muskegon Community College and pursue a career in welding. “We don’t let balls past us very often. Nate is the new guy and he’s done great, but otherwise, it’s basically a two-year starting backline.”
Last year, Werschem and the Trojans defense set a school record with 15 shutouts, including 13 in a row before a heartbreaking 1-0 loss to eventual Division 2 champion Grand Rapids Christian in a Regional Final.
This year, the Trojans have 12 shutouts and would love to get at least four more to earn a coveted spot on the soccer record board which hangs at the Ken Erny Memorial Soccer Field.
“I love playing with those guys,” said Ward, who plans to play college baseball next year. “We have so much chemistry on our backline that we are able to play as one unit. Right now, we are just so locked in, every game.”
Fruitport’s defense has been so good that opponents are often forced to gamble and commit additional resources on offense, opening up counter opportunities for speedy junior Jorge Burgos-Yack (16 goals), 6-5 senior Isaac “Big Country” VanderMolen (13 goals) and senior midfielder Grade Anspach (10 assists).
That is exactly what happened at the end of Fruitport’s tight win over Calvin Christian in Monday’s O-K Silver Tournament title game.
With Fruitport clinging to a 1-0 lead into the final minute, the Squires pulled their keeper and put on the pressure. Werschem responded with a big save and then got the ball out quickly to a streaking Burgos-Yack, who guided a shot into an empty net with 13 seconds remaining.
The Trojans are a combined 35-3-4 over the past two seasons, with 27 shutouts. Two of those three losses were to eventual state champions – Hudsonville Unity Christian (Division 3) and Grand Rapids Christian (Division 2).
Fruitport now has an awkward eight days off before opening District play Oct. 15, an idle stretch that could be an issue for many teams, but not as much for a team as deep as the Trojans.
“Our practices are super intense, sometimes more than the games,” said Packard. “Our second in line is just as good as our first, so there’s really not a big drop-off. We have 24 guys, so we run hard 11s at practice.”
While shutouts in a season would be a good school record to have, this year’s team – which consists of seven seniors, 13 juniors, two sophomores and two foreign-exchange students – is focused on a more prestigious record: most wins in a season.
The Trojans won 20 games in 2008, and this team would break that record if it is able to win its two District games and then win two Regional games for the first time. Fruitport has reached Regional Finals four times, but has never won a Regional title or played in the Semifinals or Finals.
Fruitport will likely face bitter rival Spring Lake – which provided the only blemish on the Trojans’ record this fall with a 1-1 tie Sept. 28 – in the District opener, and then it could be another rival, Muskegon Reeths-Puffer, in the District Final.
And then it only gets tougher from there.
“We talk all the time about the thin margins between winning and losing in the tournament, and how tiny details make all the difference,” said Hazekamp, a 2003 Fruitport graduate who coaches with his brother Steve. “We’ve embraced the expectations, and we’re not running from anything anymore.
“We have some guys who are hungry to get back to that point we reached last year – and then try to get a little more.”
Tom Kendra worked 23 years at The Muskegon Chronicle, including five as assistant sports editor and the final six as sports editor through 2011. E-mail him at [email protected] with story ideas for Muskegon, Oceana, Mason, Lake, Oceola, Mecosta and Newaygo counties.
PHOTOS (Top) Carter Gregor (12) celebrates his goal Oct. 3 against Wyoming Godwin Heights with teammates including Isaiah Packard, Jyles Smith and Carlos Cruz. (Middle) Packard battles a Godwin Heights player for possession as Jayden Booker looks on. (Below) Fruitport boys soccer coach Dan Hazekamp keeps a close eye on the action. (Photos by Colleen Merkins.)