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Second Half Starts Your Football Drive

August 31, 2014

By Geoff Kimmerly
Second Half editor

Just like that, the first weekend of MHSAA football season 2014 is in the books.

But we've got three more months of exciting stories to follow as September kicks off Monday.

Here's a brief breakdown of regular features to come this season on Second Half:

  • A Game for Every Fan: Weekly looks each Friday at the best games to be played in every corner of the state.


  • Drive for Detroit: Weekly reviews each Tuesday at the most significant results from the weekend across both peninsulas.


  • Be the Referee: Weekly series from our director of officiating, Mark Uyl, that will include a number of football topics during the fall.

  • This Week on MHSAA.TV: We'll fill you in on all the games available on-demand on MHSAA.TV from the week before and let you know which coming up can be watched live on a subscription basis.

  • Inside Selection Sunday: Our annual explanation of how playoff pairings are chosen and some of our toughest decisions when building brackets in October.


  • Live from the Finals: We'll cover all nine MHSAA Finals, beginning with the 8-Player championship game and through two days of 11-player title contests during Thanksgiving weekend.


  • Records Report: Each week we'll fill you in on our latest additions to the MHSAA record books, including for football, which has our largest set of listings.


  • All the scores, schedules and standings: Keep an eye on "Scores & Schedules" on MHSAA.com for scores every weekend as we receive them, and visit your favorite team's page for all results from this fall plus league standings, the rest of the schedule to come and playoff point averages.

#TBT: 120 Years of Ithaca Football Wins

October 2, 2014

By Geoff Kimmerly
Second Half editor

The Ithaca football team has won 61 straight games dating to opening night 2010, a stretch that is the longest active streak in the U.S., second-longest in MHSAA history, longest to take place fully during the MHSAA playoff era, and three wins from cracking the the national all-time top 10 list. 

But more than a century before the Yellowjackets began this era of invincibility, they were among those embracing the sport during its infancy in the late 1890s. 

Research by the Ithaca Area Historical Society led to the uncovering of the above photo of the 1899 Ithaca High School football team and all but two of the players' names. 

The Ithaca program has 376 victories dating back to the start of the 1950 season – and further research that is underway should show the team has well over 500 wins dating to its first team in 1895. Cadillac, with 512 victories, was 10th on Michigan high school football's all-time wins list heading into this season.

For some added perspective: The MHSAA was begun from a preceding organization during the 1924-25 school year. The first MHSAA playoffs were played in 1975. Ithaca's most recent varsity football loss came to Montague in a 2009 Division 6 Semifinal.