10 to Remember from 2011-12
By
Geoff Kimmerly
MHSAA.com senior editor
July 11, 2012
Second Half's mission in this, its first school year, was to tell the best stories behind the scores and highlights of MHSAA competition.
Of course, every score and especially every championship has a story behind it. The MHSAA awarded 127 team and many more individual championships in 2011-12. Obviously we can't reflect on them all. But these 10 performances were loaded with prestige, drama and accomplishment that made them incredible stories for high school sports fans regardless of hometown or allegiance.
10. Grand Ledge gymnasts earn No. 5
The Comets had to fend off a charge by Canton, but won their fifth-straight MHSAA team title by 0.825 of a point with a final score of 149.400. The fifth-straight title tied the record set by Ludington from 1975-79 and extended Grand Ledge's first-place streak to 75 consecutive events. The next day, senior Christine Wilson and junior Sara Peltier swept the Division 1 and 2 individual titles, respectively.
9. West Bloomfield's Erin Finn joins elite
The Lakers junior said after her Division 1 cross country win that she'd dreamt of winning that title since she learned how to walk. She finished fourth as a sophomore before winning the championship by a little more than a second. After establishing herself as one of the top distance runners in the country in competitions over the winter, Finn finished the school year by winning the 3,200-meter run at the Division 1 Track and Field Final.
8. More and more Morley Stanwood
The Mohawks girls pulled off a rare feat this school year -- after winning their second MHSAA volleyball title in the fall, they added a first-ever girls basketball championship. Both efforts were keyed by seniors Alexis Huntey and Bailey Cairnduf, who had the most and second-most kills in the Class C Volleyball Final and then combined for 45 points and 25 rebounds in the basketball championship game.
That argument was made after Lansing Sexton claimed its second-straight Class B boys basketball championship in dominant fashion. The Big Reds finished 27-1, their only loss by a point to Detroit Pershing, and have won 74 games over the last three seasons -- tied for sixth-most in MHSAA history for that long of a stretch. Guards Denzel Valentine (Michigan State), Anthony Clemmons (Iowa) and Bryn Forbes (Cleveland State) all signed to play at Division I colleges this fall, with junior Jalen Hayes and freshman Trevor Manuel likely joining them in a few years.
Coyotes junior Sami Michell established herself as one of the top hurdlers in MHSAA history at the Division 3 Final by becoming the first Lower Peninsula girl to win four events at a championship meet since Mason County Eastern’s Maria Shoup in 1979. She set Division 3 records in the 100 hurdles, 300 hurdles and long jump, and her 300 time also was the best in MHSAA Finals history, regardless of division or class. She also won the 200.
Top-ranked Grand Haven's latest run at an MHSAA championship seemed all but over when Grosse Pointe South led the Class A final by 18 points with just under 10 minutes to play. But Shar'Rae Davis' fullcourt sprint and score that began with 12 seconds to play gave the Buccaneers a 54-53 win and their first title. It was the third-longest comeback in MHSAA Girls Basketball Finals history.
Livonia Ladywood had been a favorite to win its first MHSAA title all season -- with four-year pitcher Briana Combs in the circle. But when Combs couldn't finish the Semifinal because of an injury, rarely-thrown sophomore Lauren Hayes stepped in. All she did was finish that game and throw a three-hitter against Saginaw Swan Valley in the Final, while also getting three hits and driving in two of the team's four runs in the championship win.
St. Johns senior Taylor Massa finished off one of the most celebrated careers in MHSAA wrestling history with his fourth championship and not one loss during his high school career. Massa claimed the title at 171 pounds this year to go with others at 145, 152 and 160. He became the 15th in MHSAA history to win four titles, ranks 20th with 221 wins and seventh in the national record book for consecutive victories.
Grosse Pointe South's girls running teams had arguably the most dominant school year in MHSAA history, first winning the Division 1 cross country title before doing the same this spring in track and field. And the Blue Devils did it with mostly the same nucleus contributing to both -- particularly juniors Hannah and Haley Meier, sophomore Kelsie Schwartz and freshman Ersula Farrow. Those four combined to run a national record time of 8:48.29 in the 3,200 relay at the Division 1 Final this spring.
1. Short walk, championship run
Second Half was created as a place to tell great stories, Cass Tech made it easy on the first day of the Football Finals. The Technicians arrived at Ford Field after a short walk from their school. They had never played in a Final before and were unranked entering the postseason. They arrived with a strong group of seniors, but also a freshman quarterback named Jayru Campbell who ended up throwing five touchdown passes in a 49-13 win over No. 2 and perennial powerhouse Detroit Catholic Central.
PHOTO: The Morley Stanwood girls basketball team prepares to celebrate as the final seconds tick off in the Mohawks' Class C Final win. (Click to see more photos from High School Sports Scene.)
4 Years of Work Paying Off as Senior-Led Linden Heads to Finals
By
Paul Costanzo
Special for MHSAA.com
October 13, 2021
Ask any member of the Linden girls golf team if she thought three years ago that the current level of success the team is enjoying was possible, and they quickly say no.
It’s tough to blame them. In 2018, the varsity team was made up of five freshmen and two sophomores, and the Eagles were struggling to be competitive, shooting a 467 in the Regional and coming in 10th out of 10 teams.
But that didn’t stop them from buying all the way in, and now the Eagles – led by those five freshmen who are now seniors – are headed to the Lower Peninsula Division 2 Finals with all of their season goals already accomplished.
“I would tell them then, ‘Three years from now, if you keep working, maybe you might have a chance to do something,’” Linden coach Jon Hamilton said. “I was talking to their parents about this, but how many kids will keep going when you tell them that if they work for something for three years, that maybe you’ll accomplish something? They did.”
Linden placed third in this year’s Region 10 tournament, shooting a 364 to qualify for the Finals, which will be played Friday and Saturday at Bedford Valley in Battle Creek. All four scorers for the Eagles – Ella LaMothe, Cate Draper, Kaitlyn Straub and Emma Lurvey – are seniors, as is Brooke Goll, who was the No. 5 on that day. All five were on the team in 2018.
“During freshman year, I wouldn’t have seen myself going to states,” LaMothe said. “I would have seen us as a team being a lot better, and maybe having a chance in the Metro League and the Regionals. But it’s taken a lot of hard work – four years of practicing every day in the fall and on our own during the summer. It’s been a lot of fun.”
It’s the first time in the nine years Hamilton has been coaching that he will take a team to the Finals, and that wasn’t the only first for the program under his guidance this season.
The Eagles won the Flint Metro League title, edging rivals Fenton and Goodrich in the league tournament. They also earned a head-to-head victory against Fenton.
After that win, Hamilton dug into his archives to pull out the scores from the 2018 showdown between the programs. Back then, Fenton won 179-257. This year, Fenton was again at 179, but Linden shot a school-record 165.
“After beating Fenton it was like, ‘Wow, we’re actually at the top of our league at the moment,’” Straub said. “It just feels amazing that we were able, as a team, to get better. It wasn’t just one singular girl getting better, it was all five of us from the beginning of freshman year to now getting better.”
LaMothe, Straub and Draper – who missed most of her freshman year with an eye injury – had played some golf before they joined the varsity squad. Lurvey said she had been on a course “a few times” but that freshman year was truly when she started. Goll was basically brand new.
“I was friends with the girls, so I figured why not try?” she said. “I had some kids clubs that I used to use to just hit some whiffle balls in my hard. I had to get a new set and everything, because those were really small.”
While they’ve made up the majority of the scoring for Linden during each of the past four years, they haven’t been completely alone. Hanna Baldwin and Cassie Most were the sophomores on that 2018 team, and Emma Most has contributed this season.
But the core has been the Class of 2022, which believed enough in itself, even when times were tough, to work toward bigger goals.
“I think that it’s super amazing,” Lurvey said. “We all didn’t really expect this at all, and this year we really just kicked it in. It’s a big accomplishment for all of us.”
The season isn’t over, of course, with the trip to Bedford Valley still to come. But while there are some admitted nerves heading into the biggest tournament of their careers, the Eagles are rolling into Battle Creek without any pressure as they’ve already accomplished all they had set out to do this season – and much more than anyone believed they were capable of just a few years ago.
“I’d say it’s probably icing on the cake,” Draper said. “We want to go in and compete, shoot a low score and place. But we’re going to go and have fun and work together as a team. I don’t really feel pressure to be the best in the state in our division. I think we’re just going in to have fun.”
Paul Costanzo served as a sportswriter at The Port Huron Times Herald from 2006-15, including three years as lead sportswriter, and prior to that as sports editor at the Hillsdale Daily News from 2005-06. He can be reached at [email protected] with story ideas for Genesee, Lapeer, St. Clair, Sanilac, Huron, Tuscola, Saginaw, Bay, Arenac, Midland and Gladwin counties.
PHOTOS (Top) Linden’s Ella LaMothe, Emma Lurvey and Kaitlyn Straub convene during the Flint Metro League Tournament, won by the Eagles. (Middle) The team’s five seniors, including also Cate Draper and Brooke Goll, have played varsity together since they were freshmen in 2018. (Below) The five seniors stand together during one last Regional, from left: Lurvey, Draper, Straub, Goll and LaMothe. (Photos courtesy of the Linden girls golf program.)