Clarkston Eying Postseason Possibilities with Challenging Regular-Season Schedule
By
Keith Dunlap
Special for MHSAA.com
December 20, 2023
It might not be January just yet, but the Clarkston hockey team has probably already felt like it has competed in the MHSAA Tournament for the 2023-24 season.
The Wolves have gone through a gauntlet of a nonleague schedule, with two games against last season’s Division 1 runner-up Brighton, a game against reigning Division 3 ion Flint Powers Catholic and a contest against Grand Rapids Forest Hills Central, a Division 1 semifinalist last winter.
However, there has been a method to the madness for a Clarkston team that’s normally not so ambitious with nonleague scheduling.
The Wolves saw a 20-win season end with a 6-1 Regional Final loss to Hartland in March, and the idea is that playing some of the state’s best so early will toughen Clarkston up further for when this season’s playoffs arrive.
“I think we’ve already kind of went through hard times and had moments of adversity,” Clarkston head coach Nathan Bryer said. “We’re already a team that has faced a lot more hardship than our team last year at this point. I think last year at this point, we were still undefeated and had an easier time with it.”
So far, Clarkston has done a good job navigating the tough early slate, with wins over Powers and Forest Hills Central and close defeats to Brighton (4-3 and 3-1).
It’s all in an effort to eventually do something no team in school history or any squad in the Oakland Activities Association has done – win a Division 1 Finals championship.
No OAA squad has reached the championship game in Division 1 since Clarkston did so in 2005, and only two have reached the Division 1 Semifinal round since 2011 (Lake Orion in 2011 and Rochester United in 2019).
Farmington is the only OAA school to ever win a Finals hockey title, doing so in Division 3 in 2014.
Based on who returns from last year’s team, Clarkston likely will be in the conversation and could represent the OAA’s best chance in recent years to have a team make it back to Plymouth and the season’s final weekend, and perhaps do some winning there also.
The Wolves return 15 players off a team that dominated the OAA last season, finishing 8-1-1 in league play.
Junior forward Ron Wade was a first-team all-state performer in Division 1, while defenseman Evan Adams was named second-team all-state.
Those two along with forward Owen Croston are the team’s captains this winter.
The Wolves are 7-2 going into a Thursday night contest against league rival Rochester Hills Stoney Creek.
With so much familiarity among players and coaches, not as much time needed to be spent during the offseason getting to know one another.
“The team is already pretty bonded this year,” Adams said. “We didn’t really have to worry that much about being a big group, or chemistry, this year.”
In January, the toughening-up process won’t end for Clarkston, given the Wolves will have a game against four-time reigning Division 1 champion Detroit Catholic Central.
“We haven’t had a hard (nonleague) schedule before until this year,” Croston said. “We just have to be ready for those games.”
When the MHSAA Tournament does roll around, Clarkston will have to jump over the same hurdles it usually must in its Regional – Hartland and Lake Orion.
Wade said the team still has lessons learned from the playoff loss to Hartland on its mind.
“We just learned that we really have to stick to our identity in those games,” he said. “This year, we have to rely on our forecheck and all of us pushing for the same thing.”
Indeed, it might not be 2024 yet, but Clarkston already has found out a lot about itself as it tries to replicate the postseason in November and December before the real one arrives.
“I think those teams who play a rigorous schedule all year, they are a little bit more battle-tested when Regionals come around,” Bryer said. “That was our goal this year, to have a team that’s played against top-10 opponents consistently all year. I think we’ll be better for it throughout the regular season, and better for it in Regionals.”
Keith Dunlap has served in Detroit-area sports media for more than two decades, including as a sportswriter at the Oakland Press from 2001-16 primarily covering high school sports but also college and professional teams. His bylines also have appeared in USA Today, the Washington Post, the Detroit Free Press, the Houston Chronicle and the Boston Globe. He served as the administrator for the Oakland Activities Association’s website from 2017-2020. Contact him at [email protected] with story ideas for Oakland, Macomb and Wayne counties
PHOTOS (Top) Clarkston warms up before a recent practice at Detroit Skate Club. (Middle) Clarkston warms up before a recent practice at Detroit Skate Club. (Photos by Keith Dunlap.)
EGR's Newton Returns to Rink Amid Speedy Recovery from Double Lung Transplant
By
Dean Holzwarth
Special for MHSAA.com
January 22, 2025
EAST GRAND RAPIDS – The last thing Chris Newton wanted to do was miss any time away from the hockey rink this season.
But when the East Grand Rapids hockey coach received a 3 a.m. phone call last month, he knew it was inevitable.
Newton also knew he would be receiving the possibility for a longer life and an opportunity to continue his lifelong passion.
Newton, who was diagnosed with cystic fibrosis at 4 months old, received news that a set of donor lungs was available, and he began the process of undergoing a second double lung transplant.
“I get a call and it was a 616 number so I knew exactly what it was, but I was totally shocked,” Newton, 35, said. “I definitely didn’t go back to sleep after that, and my mom was there visiting and everyone was surprised that it happened so quickly. If they find a good set, you can’t pass on it.”
Newton, a former Farmington High School goalie and assistant coach, had his first double lung transplant eight years ago.
“It was always in the cards that I would need one,” said Newton, a senior on the 2007-08 team that reached the Division 2 Semifinals and later an assistant coach for his dad, the late Bill Newton, with the 2013-14 Falcons squad that won the Division 3 title.
“I have a weird CF gene, and I don't qualify for the really good medicine they make that has made a difference in a lot of people's lives. A transplant was my only option as my health was decreasing pretty rapidly. And then, after eight years, you get rejection and they call it CLAD (chronic lung allograft dysfunction). The body starts rejecting lungs even though they had been good for like six years.”
Newton was diagnosed with CLAD two years ago, and it started slowly progressing.
He re-listed for another transplant in November, and 14 days later received the good news. It was two days after he collected his 100th career coaching victory.
“In comparison, the first time it was a 3½ month wait,” Newton said. “I had surgery on Dec. 10 at Corewell Health, and I came back to practice on Jan. 6. I missed two weeks of hockey with the three-week break we had, so it worked out.
“I feel great, and it's crazy to be back so quickly, but I feel good. The other sickness I have is coaching. I’m almost addicted to it when it's hockey season, and it’s really the only thing I think about. It’s what I do during these months, and it’s how I’m wired. When it happened, it was like this is perfect timing. I’m barely going to miss anything.”
The EGR hockey community has supported Newton throughout his transplant and recovery, and his players were motivated to give their best effort with their coach on the mend.
“Obviously it's been a long road for him, and it’s not the first time he has had this double lung transplant,” EGR senior center James Albers said. “It’s been pretty incredible, and all the guy wants to do is just coach hockey. He puts in all the fight, so I think the guys rally around him and want to do it for him, get big wins.
“We didn’t talk about it, but we wanted to play our best hockey for him because all he wants to do is show up at the rink for us. I have people at school ask me all the time how he’s doing, and it’s awesome to tell them that he looks incredible and is back on the ice after only a month.”
Senior Owen Stropkai has been on the varsity since his freshman year and has become close with his beloved coach.
“It’s great to have him back, and the positivity that he brings is awesome,” Stropkai said. “Every day it's a new level, and our team pushes for him. What he's been going through is horrible, but we think of him every day and grind together for him. He’s a great guy.”
Grant Newton, EGR’s associate head coach and no relation, took over the program in Chris Newton’s absence.
“We have a really good relationship, and we are close off the ice,” Chris Newton said. “I coached him at Farmington when we won a state championship, and he has helped me get the program to where it is.
“I went to him this summer, and we had a plan in place. I made sure he was comfortable taking over for me, and he did a great job.”
Chris Newton, whose family includes wife Jessie and sons Liam (6) and Carter (3), has transformed EGR into a perennial powerhouse the past few years.
The Pioneers have made back-to-back appearances in the Division 3 Final. They lost to Bloomfield Hills Cranbrook-Kingswood 3-2 in triple overtime last year and suffered a 3-2 loss to Flint Powers Catholic in 2023.
EGR reeled off seven straight wins to open this season and is currently 12-3-1 and tied for first in the Ottawa-Kent Conference Rue despite heavy graduation losses last spring.
“The one thing that is great about this team is we haven’t stopped what we've been doing the last two years when we’ve had success,” Chris Newton said. “We’re sticking to details and making it more about the program than individuals.
“Our motto this year is being uncommon. I wanted that way back in the summer before this even happened. The motto has stuck to me, that I'm uncommon, but I wanted our kids to compete and be uncommon daily, and they’ve done that. It’s been a great group to be around and a group I wanted to get back to as quickly as I could.”
Chris Newton was blessed to have a superb transplant team help him navigate the process.
“The people there were great, and my surgeon was absolutely incredible,” he said. “They are good and talented people, and the nursing staff made it way easier than I expected.
“Obviously, no guarantees or anything, and everything is going well right now,” he added. “I’m still being seen a lot and being tested, but no number can be put on it. Eight years was a good run with the first set, but you just don’t know. I don’t have a crystal ball as to what will happen.”
Dean Holzwarth has covered primarily high school sports for Grand Rapids-based WOOD-TV for five years after serving at the Grand Rapids Press and MLive for 16 years along with shorter stints at the Ionia Sentinel and WZZM. Contact him at [email protected] with story ideas for Allegan, Kent and Ottawa counties.
PHOTOS (Top) East Grand Rapids hockey coach Chris Newton instructs his team during a practice. (Middle) Newton directs his players on the bench during a game. (Below) Newton takes a photo with members of this season’s EGR team. (Photos by Grant Newton.)