St. Philip Adds to 'Tradition'
November 17, 2012
By Geoff Kimmerly
Second Half editor
BATTLE CREEK – The Battle Creek St. Philip volleyball team rushed the Kellogg Arena floor Saturday just as it has many of the other 17 times the Tigers have won the MHSAA Class D championship.
There’s no reason to do differently. As the saying goes, winning doesn't graduate. And it surely doesn't get old.
Beal City made it a little tougher than some others over the years. But like in all 72 of its wins this fall, St. Philip swept the Aggies to launch the latest celebration.
The Tigers finished this season with a 25-21, 25-15, and 25-18 victory to add another to their record championship total and pull it within one more of tying the longest volleyball title winning streak in MHSAA history.
“It’s seriously the same every time. We have the same excitement every time. It’s always special. We never get tired of it,” Tigers senior setter Lenae Lesiow said. “It’s obviously the best feeling in the world.
“It’s just tradition. We really know we have so many people supporting us. And we just want to make people proud, make ourselves proud, make our coach proud.”
Every team is different, and every coach is hesitant to compare them. But this Tigers team finished 73-2-1, setting a school record for wins and ranking as the 10th-most successful volleyball team in MHSAA history.
Beal City coach Kelly David, who has been immersed in Class D volleyball as both a player and now in her first season running the program, said this was, in her opinion, the best St. Philip team to come through.
And that made how her Aggies (45-11-1) hung close even more impressive.
Beal City was playing in its first MHSAA Final in any girls sport. Only three years ago, David was the setter as the Aggies made the Semifinals but lost to the Tigers in four games.
This time, Beal City played nearly point for point through the first and halfway into the second.
But eventually, St. Philip’s all-state hitting duo of senior Amanda McKinzie and junior Sierra Hubbard-Neil became the Aggies’ undoing.
McKinzie, named Miss Volleyball on Monday, finished with 19 kills, one short of making the MHSAA Finals record book. Hubbard-Neil, a sure contender for the statewide award next season, had 18 kills
She caught fire in the second game, while McKinzie unloaded powerful finishing shots in the third.
“They were close that whole first game, and I think we were a little bit nervous knowing, ‘Wow, they are so close,’” McKinzie said.
“We just had to relax and play our game,” Hubbard-Neil added. “When either of us as a hitter starts getting going, our setter will nail us. She just starts feeding us when we’re hot.”
Lesiow totaled 32 assists. McKinzie and senior Natalie Gallagher both had nine digs.
Beal City was led by junior middle Addie Schumacher, who had seven kills and five digs. Junior Melanie Schafer had six kills and nine digs, and senior Jade Kennedy had eight digs and 23 assists.
Kennedy and senior Monica David – the coach’s sister – were freshman call-ups for the 2009 Semifinal.
“Being freshmen, we were just part of the team and we got to cheer on our teammates,” Monica David said. “It was awesome coming back as a senior and being one of the leaders out there and being a big part of the team.”
And it couldn’t have hurt to be part of her sister’s first team as a coach.
“I lucked out having a good group of girls to start with," Kelly David said. “It’s hard to believe we’re in the Finals my first year, and it’s a lot of fun. But it’s the girls, not me. It’s the girls that got here, and I’m just excited for them.”
Groat’s program has plenty of family ties as well. With eight MHSAA championships, she’s now just one short of tying the total of her mother Sheila Guerra, her predecessor who died in 2006.
Groat found a card earlier this week that she’d gotten from her mom the year before her death. On the back was written the number “8,” and she had no idea why but thought about that over the last few days. “Maybe she knew something back then that she’s trying to tell me,” Groat said.
Another title win next season would tie Marysville’s record streak from 1997-2004. But the Tigers will have to do it with a number of new contributors.
They’ll graduate seven from this team, including four-year players McKinzie and middle Casey Gallagher and three-year players Sam Ellis and Natalie Gallagher.
“They’re like family to me. I watched them grow from little awkward freshmen to fine young ladies as seniors, and in June when they graduate it’s going to be a sad day because we’ve spent a lot of time together,” Groat said. “They’re part of my life forever.”
PHOTOS: (Top) Battle Creek St. Philip celebrates briefly after a point on the way to celebrating another Class D championship. (Middle) Jaclyn Behnke (11) and Amanda McKinzie block a kill attempt by Beal City's Addie Schumacher.
St. Phil's Winning Ways Lead to Summer Celebration, Fall Anticipation
By
Pam Shebest
Special for MHSAA.com
August 24, 2021
BATTLE CREEK — Last season’s Division 4 championship gave Battle Creek St. Philip 11 over coach Vicky Groat’s 22 seasons leading the program.
But those stats are a bit off. They do not include the three Class D titles she won as a player at St. Phil, giving her 14 overall.
“We won three state titles with Mom in ’83, ’84, ’85 and were in the final four in ’82,” Groat said.
“Mom” is Sheila Guerra, who led the Tigers to nine Finals championships while guiding the program from 1982-1997. Together, the mother-daughter duo has accounted for 20 of the school’s MHSAA-record 21 state volleyball titles. (The first was under coach Becky Emrich in 1979.) Those 21 championships, in fact, are more than twice as many as any other volleyball program in the state, and the Tigers’ 30 MHSAA Finals appearances are 17 more than the next best achiever.
That incredible success was recognized in July when Groat was named the National High School Athletic Coaches Association’s Volleyball Coach of the Year.
Guerra died in May 2006. But Mom was very much on Groat’s mind as she received her award. While accolades, awards and championships continue to pile up, Groat said her mother is the foundation for it all.
“Mom always encouraged me, and there are still things I do today that she did,” Groat said. “It may be old school, but it still works.”
And the Tigers will have another strong chance this fall to show how.
Plenty to celebrate
Groat did not tell her players that she was a finalist for the award but they found out anyway, said senior standout Brooke Dzwik, an all-state first-team outside hitter last season.
“(The players) went on this camping trip up to Leland and stayed in Coach (Laurie) Glass’ backyard,” Dzwik said. “We were also with Notre Dame Prep and Bronson. Four winning coaches.”
Dzwik said Bronson coach Jean LaClair spilled the beans, telling the players the news.
“(The other coaches) were teasing (Groat) about having a speech prepared and she was like ‘No way,’” Dzwik said.
Groat texted her players a picture of herself with the trophy, and during the first day of tryouts in August, the girls welcomed the coach with a few signs, a balloon, a card and Mountain Dew, “her favorite,” Dzwik said.
“We were just overjoyed because no one deserves it more than her.
“She walked in (to the gym) and I think she was pretty happy, but she doesn’t like the attention on her so she will never admit it.”
After her mom retired after the 1996-97 season, Groat took over, stepped away for 1999-2000 but then returned to direct the Tigers again for the last two decades.
No one, including Groat, expected her team to win the Division 4 title after starting last season with a 23-13 record, just nine athletes on the team and no junior varsity to draw from in case of injury.
“I begged (current senior) Alex Kersten to come out — she’s a cross country runner — and she did,” Groat said.
After a two-month delay because of the pandemic a year ago, practice was held outside at Battle Creek’s Bailey Park.
“We started off in the sand, and we were grateful that we were even allowed to get together and see everyone’s faces for the first time,” Dzwik said.
“It was awful at first, but (playing in sand) definitely made our legs stronger by the end of the season, and we were thankful for it.”
This year, expectations are much higher.
The Tigers lost just one player, Harleen Deol, to graduation and return five seniors also including Rachel Myers, Alexis Snyder and Bailey Fancher. Fancher made the all-state third team last season at libero.
“I feel more pressure now,” Dzwik said. “We didn’t have an amazing record last year and then pulled out a win.
“This year, we do have a (championship) win, so we placed a target on our backs.”
This season already includes a “first” for St. Phil.
“For the first time in St. Phil history, we have an eighth grader, Charli Greger (on varsity),” Groat said. “We were under 100 students last year, so we could have eighth graders play this year.
“Right now, we’re at 100 (students) so next year we won’t be able to have eighth graders.”
Other players are juniors Maddie Hoelscher and Kate Doyle and sophomores Rylee Altman and Makenzee Grimm.
Groat also has a junior varsity team for the first time in two years – a really good thing, she said.
“Take out the five seniors next year and I’m left with four players if I don’t have a JV team,” she said. “We brought eighth graders up to the JV team with four freshmen.
“Never thought we’d have to do that, but we want a program. I couldn’t imagine not having a St. Phil volleyball team. That would be a sad day.”
Family tradition
While a student at St. Phil, Groat was coached by her mother in volleyball and track. In addition, Groat’s father Lou coached basketball at the school.
Her parents as her coaches was not always an easy combination for a young teen.
“It’s always the coach’s kid who gets the brunt of it.” Groat said. “I still remember one of my friends and I were fighting during volleyball and my mom was blaming me. I was like, what about her?
“In track if she had no one to run something, ‘Vicky, you’re going to do it.’ But it was fun.”
Groat, who is also principal and athletic director at the school, credits her parents for not only her coaching success, but her life skills.
“I learned from the best.” she said. “I try to carry both their philosophies in the way they treated people.
“My mom was tough on kids, but if anybody needed anything, she was the first one there. She pushed hard and had high expectations, but she really was a softie inside. People still don’t believe me on that.”
Groat relies on one other person who is like family: assistant coach Angela Williams Frost.
“We call her Willi,” Groat said. “She’s been a great assistant for 18 years. She was a head coach at Springport and could be a head coach anywhere in the state.
“She’s very talented and smart. It makes my job easier knowing that Willi is there. I’ll be in practice and someone will come to the door for me and Willi is there to take over.”
July’s recognition was a total surprise, Groat said, deflecting any accolades. But it also can be regarded as deserved praise for her work teaching an abundance of lessons she learned herself as part of the volleyball program and the Guerra coaching tree.
“It’s just so much about my kids, the kids who have been here and who have played in our system,” she said. “It’s not a big school; we have our traditions, and they buy into it. It’s been great.
“Hopefully over the years we, as coaches, have taught them the important things in life, the life lessons that they will carry on. Sports are an important part of it, but there are other things involved.”
Pam Shebest served as a sportswriter at the Kalamazoo Gazette from 1985-2009 after 11 years part-time with the Gazette while teaching French and English at White Pigeon High School. She can be reached at [email protected] with story ideas for Calhoun, Kalamazoo and Van Buren counties.
PHOTOS: (Top) Battle Creek St. Philip coach Vicky Groat holds up a picture of her mother, Sheila Guerra, with whom she’s combined to lead the Tigers to 20 of their 21 MHSAA Finals volleyball championships. (Middle) Senior Brooke Dzwik shows some of the signs she and teammates made to celebrate Groat’s national Coach of the Year recognition. (Below) Then-junior Bailey Fancher serves during last season’s Division 4 title match. (Top and middle photos by Pam Shebest.)