Monroe St. Mary's Boys Finish Meteoric Rise with 1st Finals Team Title
By
Todd VanSickle
Special for MHSAA.com
May 30, 2026
KENT CITY – This was a season of first for the Monroe St. Mary Catholic Central boys track & field program.
And for the first time in school history Saturday, the Falcons won a Finals championship, scoring 39 points to claim the MHSAA Lower Peninsula Division 3 title.
Elk Rapids (32) took second and Reed City (31) was third.
“What an amazing day,” said SMCC coach Roman Smith. “This is very exciting. This is the first year our boys have even won a league meet. We went from being winless to state champions. It is pretty special. We have special group of kids.”
Monroe St. Mary’s 400 relay team earned a first place (42.20). The team included Cole Reinhardt, Gavin Swartout, Vince Harris and Brady Reinhardt.
“We had a plan going in to it,” Smith said. “As a coach you look at what your kids can do and seed times, and you hope that they live up to that.”
Monroe St. Mary’s first-year coach felt comfortable with how his relay teams were expected to perform, but knew it would take more to pull off a team championship.
“We knew we had to have some special things happen with our individual medalists, and those things happened,” Smith said. “When you have a kid seeded 23rd and he ends up with a third-place finish in the 100 meters, it really helps when it comes to points.”
Smith was referring to Gavin Swartout, who ran 10.82 seconds in the 100 meters for third place. Wyatt Dehring, of Clinton, won the sprint (10.75).
“I just told my kids to run your marks; go run the times you know you can run and let the chips fall,” Smith said. “It was a battle towards the end. When people were saying we won mathematically, I didn’t believe it. I didn’t want to talk about it.”
Elk Rapids slid into second place late in the meet.
“We are a young group and worked hard to get here,” said Elk Rapids’ coach Cameron Ward. “This means everything. It is still a surprise. It was a great team effort, and hopefully there is more to come.”
The Elks’ were led by freshman Garett Godden, who took second in the 100 meters (10.79) and 200 meters (21.80), the latter after he ran a personal best in the prelims (21.66). All told, he competed in four events.
“With all this running, your legs get so tired,” Godden said, who was making his first Finals appearance. “(This meet) is definitely bigger and a lot more people. It gives me adrenaline.”
The Elks also won the 1,600 relay (3:23.58) with Noah Liggett, Miles Prabhaker, Gavin Hamilton, and Godden. The same team took second in the 800 relay (1:30.07) behind Adrian Madison’s Wade Garza, Bryson Ballantyne, Derrell Tillman and De’Lante Garrison (1:30.01).
Jonesville’s 3,200 relay team (8:01.99) rounded out the relay winners with a team of Nicholas Fowler, Collin Fucile, Ashton Potwin and Caleb Blonde.
In the field events, Montague’s Isaac French won the shot put (54-1), and Bronson’s Brayden Fritz threw the discus 164-2 to claim the title. The top high jumper was Tayeden Redding, of Warren Michigan, with a clearance of 6-6, and Tucker Wiginton, of Springport, pole vaulted a winning height of 15 feet. Reed City senior Jack Deitsch repeated in the long jump (23-5¼).
Charlevoix’s Hunter Eaton ran a personal best to win the 1,600 meters (4:16.08).
“At the 600-meter mark, I was like let’s hammer down and see what happens,” Eaton said. “I was going into today fearing nobody. Try to win. That was the goal.”
It was his third individual Finals title. Last year, he also won the 1,600, and he was the Division 3 cross country champion in the fall.
Eaton also finished fourth in the 3,200 (9:34.53). Logan Youngman, of Hillsdale, won with a personal best performance (9.26.08). Monroe St. Mary’s Christian Craanen took second with a personal best (9:29.35).
Lansing Catholic’s Leland VanAlstine won both the 300 hurdles (14.19) and 110 hurdles (14.42). Detroit Edison senior Dennis Jackson repeated as the 400 champ with a season-best time (48.11) and finished second in the 200 meters (21.80) after finishing fourth last year. Landon Rogers, of Red Arrow (Three Oaks River Valley/New Buffalo), won the 800 meters (1:56.15). Central Montcalm's Zade Kooistra finished first in the adaptive 100 and shot put.
PHOTOS (Top) SMCC's Brady Reinhart, center, runs the final leg for his team's winning 400 relay Saturday. (Middle) Elk Rapids' Garett Godden sets the pace for the winning 1,600 relay. (Click for more from Mary Wilson and John Willoughby/RunMichigan.com.)
Record Throws Set Up Carson City-Crystal's Soar to 1st Title
By
Will Kennedy
Special for Second Half
June 5, 2021
HUDSONVILLE —For the first time in school history, the Carson City-Crystal Eagles boys track & field team has claimed the title of state champion.
Carson City-Crystal finished Saturday’s Lower Peninsula Division 4 Finals with 68.5 points, 10.5 more than the closest competitor. The Eagles did it with a small group – only eight athletes travelled to Hudsonville to compete. But by the end of the day, all of them had earned the title of all-state athlete.
Junior Zane Forist got the day started off on the right foot in the field events. He won the discus with a throw of 196-5, nearly 60 feet more than the second-place finisher. He also won the shot put with a hurl of 62-4, over 14 feet more than anybody else.
Both were meet records – the discus toss breaking the 190-0 throw by Litchfield’s Jacob Patrick in 2012. The shot put bested the former LPD4 record of 58-5.25 by Ottawa Lake Whiteford’s George Flanner in 2007. And together gave Carson City-Crystal a comfortable lead heading into the track finals, helping alleviate the pressure on the rest of the team.
“When you have the number one thrower, that kind of helps,” said Eagles coach Grant Woodman. “The field events set the tone, and then we let our distance guys ease into it and it just works out for us.”
The distance runners did what they had to do to get the job done. Senior Coleman Clark earned second place in the 1,600 and the top spot in the 3,200. Those points helped keep Saugatuck at bay and put the Eagles firmly atop the podium.
Clark said that in other years, he focused on his individual performance. But this time around, he knew he wanted to give it his all for the overall team victory.
“This year, going into the season knowing we would have a top team, I knew I was going to be team-focused,” Clark said. “It feels so good to hit that top goal as a team. We knew we could do it.”
Jaylin Townsend from Flint Beecher set the standard in sprint events. He came away with an individual title in the 100 with a personal record time of 10.98 and edged Saugatuck’s Benny Diaz for first in the 200 with a time of 22.75. Townsend also helped lead the Buccaneers to a title in the 800 relay with a school record of 1:30.59.
The sophomore said that when he crossed the finish line as a Finals champion for the first time, he got excited realizing he was among the elite of the elite runners in Michigan.
“It feels great,” Townsend said. “I’m always thinking that I have to win, I have to win. … The excitement through my head is just so crazy. Only a couple people can really be state champions, and I’m one of them.”
Diaz earned two individual titles himself, in the 110 hurdles with a time of 14.77 and in the 300 hurdles, crossing the line in 39.59.
While all the excitement was taking place on the track, Wyoming Potter’s House Christian junior Jok Nhial finished first in the long jump with an incredible leap of 21-09.50, a personal record. He shattered his previous PR by seven inches, something he wasn’t expecting to do Saturday.
“It feels amazing that I’m able to do this at the state championship,” Nhial said. “I didn’t expect to make a PR today, or even break our school record. It was a great moment. I’ve worked so hard and for this to be the outcome, it feels great.”
But the true triumph of the day belonged to Carson City-Crystal. The eight athletes and the coaching staff were able to put together a season that none of them will soon forget.
“Everybody stepped up and did their part,” Forist said. “It really is a team thing. It wasn’t just a one-man show. Everybody did their thing. It’s so awesome.”
PHOTOS: (Top) Carson City-Crystal celebrates its first MHSAA Finals championship in track & field. (Middle) Flint Beecher's Jaylin Townsend, right, races Saugatuck's Benny Diaz. (Below) The Eagles' Coleman Clark races in the 3,200. (Photos by Will Kennedy.)