Plymouth Christian Completes Repeat Run
November 18, 2017
By Perry A. Farrell
Special for Second Half
BATTLE CREEK – Plymouth Christian Academy coach D.J. Kellogg and his Eagles flew into Kellogg Arena as the reigning Class D volleyball champions.
They left the same way Saturday morning after dispatching the Fowler Eagles 25-18, 25-23, 25-21 in this year’s Final.
In a division that had been dominated by Battle Creek St. Philip and Leland over the last two decades, the Eagles now sit atop Class D for the second straight season.
Sisters Grace and Gabriella Kellogg led the offense with 15 kills each, while Abigail Pray contributed 31 assists for the winners, who improved to 45-8-3.
“Winning this with my daughters means everything,’’ said D.J. Kellogg. “We didn’t really plan it this way. I coached them in club. It gives you a chance to spend quality time with your kids.
“I never like being the one ranked first because you have a target on your back, but having lost eight from last year it was a completely different animal this year,’’ Kellogg added. “It wasn’t like there was a pressure to repeat because we lost most of the team. I try to play a tougher schedule so we don’t get too cocky.’’
It worked.
Tied 8-8 during the first game, Plymouth Christian reeled off eight of the next nine points to take a 16-9 lead against the first-time finalist.
Plymouth Christian’s lead reached 20-12, forcing Fowler coach Patty Feldpausch to call a timeout to stem the tide.
It was too late. Plymouth Christian was never threatened in finishing the first set win.
In the second, Plymouth Christian made its move with the score tied 5-5.
The Eagles scored three straight points to take an 8-5 lead, and after an ace by Grace Kellogg, Fowler was forced to call another timeout while trailing by four.
Fowler scored the next two points after the timeout, but Plymouth Christian was on another roll.
Robin Alert’s back-to-back aces had the Eagles in control at 13-8. The lead grew to 16-9 as the reigning champ’s poise and experience started to dominate the match.
Fowler didn’t go away easy, scoring four straight points of its own to trim the deficit to 17-14. Fowler elevated its play and Plymouth Christian got sloppy as the deficit was trimmed to 22-21, forcing Kellogg to call his first timeout of the match.
But after a few anxious points, the defending champs prevailed when Fowler hit a ball out to give Plymouth Christian a 2-0 lead.
Fowler turned the tables on Plymouth Christian in the third game, scoring six of the first eight points to lead by four with Kellogg calling a timeout in an attempt to change momentum.
It didn’t fare better after the timeout as Fowler scored the next two points to increase its lead to 8-2.
Fowler fought to stay ahead, but when a kill by sophomore Gabriella Kellogg reduced the lead to 10-9, Feldpausch called a timeout to keep her team in the championship.
A kill by Elise Miera brought Plymouth Christian all the way back at 11-11, and a kill on the next point gave them a one-point lead – which turned into a 14-11 by the end of a 12-3 run.
Marissa Snyder had 11 kills for Fowler (38-12-5), and senior Kennedy Koenigsknecht had 25 assists. The team made quite a turnaround after winning only 12 matches a season ago, and Tuesday’s Quarterfinal victory also was a program first.
Plymouth Christian had been ranked No. 1 all season long and dropped only two sets during the postseason.
“We lost a lot of great players from last year,’’ said Grace, a senior. “To come back and do it again is great. Our JV team last year was good. We had a lot of girls come up from that team and step it up. This is our third straight year here. Last year we were ready to go and knew what to expect.’’
Another championship.
PHOTOS: (Top) Plymouth Christian Academy’s Grace Kellogg (3) sends a kill past a pair of Fowler blockers during Saturday morning’s Class D Final. (Middle) Plymouth Christian raises the champion’s trophy for the second straight season.
'On the Map:' Nwabueze Hitting Rising Bloomfield Hills Into Championship Mix
By
Keith Dunlap
Special for MHSAA.com
October 30, 2025
BLOOMFIELD HILLS – Those who have kept an eye on the Division 1 state volleyball rankings this season may have done a double take at least a few times throughout the fall.
Was that Bloomfield Hills consistently ranked among the top five and now No. 2 in the latest coaches poll? Ahead of state powers such as Farmington Hills Mercy and Bloomfield Hills Marian?
Yes, that has been the case.
“I think we’ve put ourselves on the map this year,” said senior Kayla Nwabueze.
To those more familiar with Bloomfield Hills, it’s easier to see the biggest reason why the Blackhawks have become such a force – Nwabueze’s transcendent talent.
A finalist for the Miss Volleyball Award, she just surpassed 2,000 career kills, 1,000 career digs and 1,300 career receptions, and owns the school record for kills (2,013 heading into Wednesday’s match against Rochester).
Nwabueze has excelled at multiple positions on the court throughout her high school and club careers. But this season, first-year Bloomfield Hills head coach Brian Kim decided to put Nwabueze exclusively at outside hitter, and she had delivered with 547 kills heading into that Rochester match.
“It allowed her to have a more defined role in our offense,” Kim said. “Middle is her primary position, and she is extremely strong and capable in the middle. But we moved her to the outside to help out our offense.”
Nwabueze didn’t start club volleyball until age 12. But that didn’t mean she didn’t have skills already developed. Nwabueze has an older sister, Ashlea, who played the sport, and the two would constantly do drills and have practice sessions together before Kayla got into club ball.
“We definitely were playing outside,” Kayla said. “She definitely taught me to play volleyball in the backyard and helped me grow in volleyball.”
As much of a surgeon as Nwabueze is on the court – showing exceptional precision with her hitting – she wants to be an even better one off the court one day.
Nwabueze will play college volleyball at Harvard, where she wants to study medicine and ultimately become an orthopedic surgeon.
Nwabueze carries a 4.0 grade-point average attending the prestigious International Academy in Bloomfield Hills, which doesn’t have sports programs and allows students to play sports in the Bloomfield Hills district.
While she had overtures to play for more prominent college volleyball programs, the academic side of things was more of a priority – making Harvard the fit.
“I was just thinking about more than just volleyball and what I wanted to do after the fact,” said Nwabueze, who also considered Yale. “Harvard really had a nice plan for me.”
But there is more business to be taken care of in the coming weeks before Nwabueze starts focusing on that part of her future.
First, she is a legitimate candidate to become the first player in school history to win the Miss Volleyball Award.
More importantly, she wants to help Bloomfield Hills continue what’s been a historic season.
The Black Hawks will play in a District next week at Troy Athens, where a likely District Final matchup with No. 4-ranked and neighbor Bloomfield Hills Marian awaits.
Each team has a bye into Wednesday’s semifinal round, and barring major upsets, they should get through to face each other on Nov. 7.
“It is special to know that I broke some of the records here and set that bar,” Nwabueze said. “We have done so good this year, and we are still going and are still playing hard. I hope we can go farther.”
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.
PHOTO (Top) Bloomfield Hills’ Kayla Nwabueze (19) winds up for a kill attempt this season against Lake Orion. (Photo by Kristina Sikora/KMS Photography. Headshot by Keith Dunlap.)