Kalamazoo Christian Continues to Inspire, Taking Final Step for 1st Title
By
Paul Costanzo
Special for MHSAA.com
November 18, 2023
BATTLE CREEK – The ball hadn’t stopped bouncing before the tears came for Holland DeVries.
The Kalamazoo Christian senior’s spike caromed off a Traverse City St. Francis block Saturday, spinning to the ground to end the Division 3 Volleyball Final at Kellogg Arena.
DeVries immediately turned, emotions taking over her face, and joined her teammates in a pile on the court.
“I’ve been on this team for four years, and we’ve worked so hard – I’ve been playing since sixth grade with six of these seniors,” DeVries said. “It just means so much to us, because this is all we’ve worked for since we were literally 10 years old. It just means so much.”
DeVries and the Comets defeated St. Francis 26-24, 16-25, 25-23, 25-20 to claim the first volleyball title in school history. It came a year after they were runners-up, losing in four sets against Pewamo-Westphalia.
Earlier in the week, the Comets slayed that dragon, downing the Pirates in a Quarterfinal, but they weren’t satisfied until coach Carlie Southland was handed the Finals championship trophy.
“Especially for our seniors, we had six of them this year, and this was their last shot,” Southland said. “We made it a goal to win the state Finals, so it feels extra good to have done that. We watched a lot of film from last year and said, ‘What are the reasons that we lost?’ We watched that film, we picked out those reasons and said, ‘OK, we’re going to work on those reasons this year at the beginning of the year to make sure we are ready to come back here again this year.’”
The main takeaway? Mental toughness.
DeVries said she and her teammates knew that had to be a focus if they were going to achieve their goals, and it was apparent Saturday, as it was tested early and often.
Kalamazoo Christian didn’t take a lead in the first set until 25-24, as it fell behind 13-3.
After chipping away and spending most of the set down a single point, a kill from DeVries and an emphatic block by Hayden Deming gave the Comets the 26-24 victory in the set, which featured seven kills from Makenna Ekkens.
While St. Francis won the second set going away, the third and fourth were back and forth throughout, but it was the Comets who found a way to come out ahead in each.
“My team literally just was so good and pushed through,” DeVries said. “We didn’t play the best that we’ve played all tournament, but I still think that it shows that even when we’re not playing great, we can still push through and still win. We’ve been working a lot on mental toughness, and I think we did well on that tonight.”
DeVries finished with 16 kills and 27 digs for the Comets (43-6-3), while Ekkens had 17 kills and 14 digs. They’re two of the six seniors, joined by classmates Mackenzie Ash, Lola Stecker, Jovie Cochran and Sophia Nash.
All six contributed to the program’s first Finals title.
Cochran finished her last match with a team-high 28 digs, while Stecker had 39 assists and 11 digs. Ash had four total blocks, and Nash had five digs.
“It makes me so emotional, because I know that there’s younger girls now that look up to us a lot,” DeVries said. “I know that there’s 40-something girls trying out for the team. That just shows that we’ve inspired them to play, and I hope that this program keeps building on and on.”
Annelise DeJong added 11 kills for Kalamazoo Christian.
St. Francis also was seeking its first title, having been Class C runner-up in 2012. With just two seniors on the roster and several sophomore contributors, however, the future looks very bright.
It was one of those seniors, Garnet Mullet, who tied for the team lead with 15 kills for St. Francis (38-10-1), to go along with 18 digs.
Quinn Yenshaw also had 15 kills and added 19 digs for the Gladiators, while Reese Jones had 24 assists and 19 digs, and Tessah Konas had 15 assists.
“Our focus has been on shifting our culture to playing for each other instead of ourselves for a long time,” St. Francis coach Kathleen Nance said. “They really owned that. I think that we’re just going to continue to climb.”
PHOTOS (Top) Kalamazoo Christian players hoist their Division 3 championship trophy Saturday at Kellogg Arena. (Middle) Kalamazoo Christian's Holland DeVries (5) attempts to block a kill attempt by St. Francis' Claire Hurley (9). (Below) Jovie Cochran (8) and Makenna Ekkens celebrate. (Photos by Hockey Weekly Action Photos.)
Fowler Seniors Make Childhood Dream Come True with 1st Finals Championship
By
Paul Costanzo
Special for MHSAA.com
November 22, 2025
BATTLE CREEK – The Fowler volleyball team called its shot in January, naming its group chat “State Champs.”
But the Class of 2026 has believed that was the endgame for much longer than that.
Behind the leadership of nine seniors, they made it happen Saturday, as the Eagles claimed the school’s first volleyball Finals title, sweeping Mendon 30-28, 25-19, 25-22 in the Division 4 championship match at Kellogg Arena.
“I think we’ve known the whole time that if we stick with it and we push each other, that we could do good things,” senior middle hitter Josie Simon said. “I think especially last year, we wanted to do it for those seniors, and that hurt us. We knew during that Regional Final game that it was the big game, so when we lost we knew we had to come in this year and we were ready to go. We knew what we were chasing.”
Saturday’s Finals appearance was just the second in school history for Fowler, and first since 2017. That year, Simon and her classmates were fourth graders, and several of them were at Kellogg Arena watching.
The following year, their own journey began.
“I’m super thrilled for them, and they literally have been talking about this since they were in the fifth grade when they started playing volleyball,” Fowler coach Patty Feldpausch said. “To want something so bad and know you have to stay focused, and know that mistakes don’t matter because the next ball matters, that’s a big deal. We don’t have our individual names on the back of their warm-up shirts. Their name is not on there because that’s not important. It’s what we’re doing together, that’s what’s important. They believed it, and that’s why we’re sitting at this table being the champions.”
While they’d rather not wait another eight years, the Eagles know they could have sparked that same drive and belief in a group of girls watching Saturday.
“Making history and showing little kids that it’s possible, like it’s hard, but we did it and they can do it,” senior Myah Pohl said. “For the kids that we waved at, and they supported us – they can do it, too.”
Those kids witnessed an incredible team effort that led to a title, as the Eagles had 10 players record a dig, and five add at least seven kills to the attack.
At the heart of that were a trio of seniors, as Paige Thelen had 21 kills, Rachel Wirth had 21 digs and Neelah O’Rourke had 48 assists.
Fittingly, that trio combined for the final dig, assist and kill of the game, as Thelen pounded home an O’Rourke set, which came off a Wirth pass, for match point.
O’Rourke’s 48 assists are the most in a three-set Finals match since the move to divisions in 2018.
“She’s the only player I hugged – we got rushed around,” Feldpausch said with a laugh. “She just did a great job today. Our defense was giving her good balls to feed and our hitters did a great job against their big block. Neelah just kept her composure. She was amazing, she did great.”
Skylar Fowler was a big part of that attack as well, recording 10 kills, while Pohl had nine, Elizabeth Wirth had eight and Simon had seven. Selena Stump had 13 digs for the Eagles (36-8-2), with O’Rourke adding 12 and Thelen 11.
Most of the drama in the match came during the first set, as it took 30 points to settle it. While each point was tense, the final point featured a long back and forth that ended with a block from Simon and Stump.
“It’s tough to lose an opening set like that,” Mendon coach Kenneth Herbert said. “We’ve said it all season long, that we’re never out of a match. Even though we lost that first set, we felt from that moment we could still battle. And even to the last point, I felt that we were still battling. That’s all I can ask for out of these girls.”
Cienna Nightingale led the Mendon attack with 14 kills, adding 12 digs, while Gracie Shultz had nine kills and 19 digs. Karyssa Holtz had 24 assists for the Hornets (38-7-1), while Jadyn Samson had 20 digs.
“Good for them, they found our weaknesses and found ways to shut us down,” Schultz said. “We played as well as we could. I wouldn’t have done anything different. We gave everything on the court.”
PHOTOS (Top) Fowler’s Skylar Fowler (7) powers a kill past Mendon’s Gracie Schultz (7) and Sabrina Monroy (12) during Saturday’s Division 4 Final. (Middle) The Eagles’ Paige Thelen (13) connects as Karyssa Holtz (3) and Lashell Blair line up to block.