'The Beast' Powering Traverse City St. Francis Into Contenders Conversation
By
Tom Spencer
Special for MHSAA.com
April 25, 2025
Her teammates don’t call her by her nickname, but they’re quite aware of why she’s earned it.
Her coaches definitely use the nickname, and fondly.
And opponents … well, they just know she fits the description when on the soccer pitch. They often employ double and triple teams to try to stop her.
Her name is Sidney Peters and she wears number 14 for Traverse City St. Francis. She was an all-state selection last year as a sophomore, leading St. Francis to the Regional.
She’s now well-known as “The Beast.”
“She is just so physically sound and she’s not afraid to go body to body, and she’s not afraid to take over the game and control it just by moving out of the way and not taking on contact,” said her coach Scott Conway. “She always has her head up, always looking to distribute first and then if she has to hammer, she takes it over — that’s what I love about her.”
Despite sitting out one of the Gladiators’ eight games this season to nurse a lingering ankle injury, Peters has seven goals and a team-leading 12 assists.
The Glads got off to a 5-0 start this year before taking a couple of tough losses. They got back on the winning track this week at Kingsley. They’re looking to pick up three wins this weekend at the Big Rapids Invitational as they take on Gaylord, Ludington and the host Cardinals.
“I think it was hard coming off a win against Williamston and then playing two tough teams,” Peters acknowledged. “There was a lot of reflecting lately coming into the game with Kingsley about our performance and what we need to do to get better. We wanted to really control the game a little bit more than we did the last few games.”
Peters took control in the 5-0 win over Kingsley on Wednesday. She dominated possession and worked the passing lanes while picking up assists on four of the Gladiators’ five goals.
That win is helping Peters and her teammates look ahead to this weekend’s tournament and also matches against bigger schools down the road including Midland, Marquette and Pontiac Notre Dame Prep. Now 6-2, the Gladiators have found themselves ranked in the top 10 all season in Division 3, including at No. 7 this week.
“I am really looking forward to those games that are super important,” said Peters. “It’s showing people smalls schools can do it. When we go against big schools — even if it’s a loss — if we put up a good fight and show we can hang, that’s something to be proud of, I think.”
Peters plays competitive travel soccer in the fall and trains all winter. She’s always striving to grow her game and improve. Among her strengths, Conway noted, is her ability to maintain composure under pressure while constantly striving for success.
She was stoic and calm growing up, with high levels of mental strength and toughness. Her family and coaches believe that those traits, paired with her physical strength and aggressiveness, make Peters a perfect fit for the sport.
“Sid is playing out of her mind,” said Conway, now in his sixth year at the helm for St. Francis. “She’s my top player. She’s already coming out strong with her stats this year, and I expect them to improve.”
Becoming “The Beast,” so the story goes, happened during her youth soccer days. Her spectacular freshmen year led Conway to go public with the name. And while her teammates don’t say the name, they do acknowledge it with their actions in practice.
“They definitely don’t like to go up against me in practice,” Peters said of her teammates. “They’re like, ‘She’s going to push me over’ or whatever, but I’ve never heard it (the nickname).”
Among her favorites aspects of soccer is the physical play, Peters admitted. It started in her center back playing days in youth soccer. She began receiving attention from opponents as she was named all-state honorable mention as a freshman.
“Coming from my freshman year where I wasn’t known to my sophomore year where people start to know you playing you two times per season, and it’s like, ‘Let’s put a girl on her and try to mark her’ and after that it started to be ‘try to take her out, let’s foul her,’” Peters said. “It’s part of the game — when two or three people are going at you, it is going to get physical.”
Peters isn’t the only reason the Gladiators are looking forward to great things this season. They are coming off an 18-2-1 finish a year ago and are led in goals scored by junior Riley Collins with 12, while senior Lillian David has added 11.
And they have a strong defense led by center back Grace Rowe and stingy goaltender Paisleigh Upshaw, who was second-team all-state as a sophomore. The Glads have allowed only six goals this spring.
“We’ve got some of the top players in the state, especially D3,” Conway said. “I am very blessed to have them part of the St. Francis program.”
After St. Francis won its first Lake Michigan Conference girls soccer title last year, the league was disbanded. The Gladiators are playing as independents this spring.
That has the Glads focused solely on a run through the Regional. They’ll have to repeat as District champions first, heading to the Hart District where they could face Clare, Kingsley, Manistee, Reed City, Remus Chippewa Hills and the host Pirates.
“The expectation is for us to continue to develop and get better as a squad,” Conway said. “And then make a nice postseason run, and I truly believe with this group of girls we shouldn't have any problem doing that.”
Tom Spencer is a longtime MHSAA-registered basketball and soccer official, and former softball and baseball official, and he also has coached in the northern Lower Peninsula area. He previously has written for the Saginaw News, Bay County Sports Page and Midland Daily News. He can be reached at [email protected] with story ideas for Manistee, Wexford, Missaukee, Roscommon, Ogemaw, Iosco, Alcona, Oscoda, Crawford, Kalkaska, Grand Traverse, Benzie, Leelanau, Antrim, Otsego, Montmorency, Alpena, Presque Isle, Cheboygan, Charlevoix and Emmet counties.
PHOTOS (Top) Traverse City St. Francis’ Sidney Peters (14) controls possession against Kingsley. (Middle) Peters and teammate Reese Muma (4) exchange high-fives during their game against Williamston. (Photos by Julie English.)
Bolstered by Bonnema, Kalamazoo Christian Adds 2nd Win of 4-Year Finals Run
By
Paul Costanzo
Special for MHSAA.com
June 14, 2025
EAST LANSING – Kalamazoo Christian girls soccer coach Jay Allen was asking a lot of senior midfielder Jordyn Bonnema during Saturday’s Division 4 Final at Michigan State University.
Bonnema was tasked with tracking Grosse Pointe Woods University Liggett’s Kerith Short around the field, and making sure the Knights’ leading scorer didn’t get free.
Just as Allen expected, Bonnema did her part, and then some.
The Kalamazoo Christian senior scored a pair of goals and made life difficult for Short in the Comets’ 4-1 victory at DeMartin Stadium.
“She’s just a pure athlete,” Allen said. “She was bound and determined to win. It’s not just in soccer – it’s golf, it’s in basketball, it’s in the classroom, she’s a 3.9 student. The kid doesn’t know a loss. She’s driven.”
The title was the sixth in program history for the Comets, and second in three years. They were making their fourth-straight Finals appearance, having lost in a shootout a year ago against Jackson Lumen Christi.
For Bonnema, who had played in all four of those Finals, walking away as runner-up again was not an option.
“This is my last time in the black and gold, or purple and gold, and it’s bittersweet, but I just wanted to give it my all,” she said. “This has been such a long ride. Soccer was my first sport, I picked it up when I was 3 years old. To be here, stepping on the field for maybe the last time in my life, there can be no regrets. So I was just coming into the game with that mentality, that this might be the last time I’m ever going to lace up the cleats, so making sure I left nothing behind and leave it all on the field. I’m just super grateful for the opportunity to play for such an amazing program and with my best friends.”
Bonnema scored the second and third goals for Kalamazoo Christian, twice giving her team a two-goal lead in the second half. Izzy Suloff and Laila Rashid also scored, while Avery Lambarth had two assists and Rachel Miller had one.
Kalamazoo Christian keeper Kailey Triemstra had nine saves. Most came on shots from outside the box, as the Comets defense, led by Maysen Steensma, did a good job of limiting opportunities for the Knights.
“I give them a lot of credit; they were defensively really solid,” Liggett coach David Dwaihy said. “They were really organized. They’d bend, but they didn’t break. They did all the things championship teams do defensively, and their goalie was there for them when they needed. Full credit to them, they deserve that. I thought that we did give them a good game, though, and I thought we represented ourselves really well and played with a style we can feel really good about.”
Short did score the lone goal for Liggett, bending in an Olimpico off a corner kick, after she had created the best scoring chance of the afternoon for her team, cutting inside on a defender and getting off a shot that deflected wide.
It was clear, though, each time she touched the ball that the Comets were determined to not give her any space to work.
“Our gameplan was Jordyn Bonnema,” Allen said. “Jordyn Bonnema was told you just can’t let her beat us. Jordyn just shadowed her, made sure she didn’t get clean looks, and that’s where we were at. We also fall back on Maysen Steensma, who is a solid brick wall back there, and kind of organized things. It was just a group effort.”
Kalamazoo Christian, which arrived late to the 2024 Final after its bus broke down, got off to a quick start Saturday, scoring within the first three minutes. Suloff collected the ball near the top of the box, created space to her right and fired a shot over the head of Liggett keeper Aline Rahaim, who had six saves on the day.
The second half opened much the same, as Bonnema scored less than three minutes in, charging into the box and getting on the end of a cross from Lambarth, making it 2-0.
While that looked to have killed momentum Liggett had been building through the end of the first half, the Knights found their answer five minutes later with Short’s goal.
“I think in the first half it helped us; in a weird way, I think it kind of woke us up,” Dwaihy said. “While playing from behind, we were a little more relaxed, and that ‘Let’s play to win’ vibe, as opposed to playing not to lose. It really favored us for the rest of the half. The next 37 minutes, we worked our way into the game and got some chances, but more importantly, we held a lot of the possession. That was key, because as we started to lose that in the second half, tired legs started to set in and the game got away from us.”
Bonnema made it a two-goal game again, scoring with a header off Miller’s corner with 10:14 to play.
“It’s for sure a little more reassuring, but we’re still back on defense and for sure not ready (to celebrate) until the clock hits zero,” Bonnema said. “It was nice to have a little bit of a gap, though, for sure.”
When Rashid followed up Lambarth’s shot and made it 4-1 with 7:05 to go, however, the die was cast, and it was clear the Comets would be lifting the trophy.
“This senior class has been here four times, so to end their senior year like this is special for them,” Allen said. “They are just such a hard-working group, and with all the hard work they put in, we were knocking off teams we shouldn’t have been and we got here. This week, and the last two days of practice, you could tell they wanted it, and we didn’t quit for 80 minutes.”
PHOTOS (Top) Kalamazoo Christian players celebrate during their Division 4 championship win Saturday at DeMartin Stadium. (Middle) The Comets’ Jordyn Bonnema (21) marks University Liggett’s Aubrey Hermann. (Photos by Adam Sheehan/Hockey Weekly Action Photos.)