Did you see that?
April 30, 2012
By Geoff Kimmerly
Second Half editor
It's only the end of April. But a number of Michigan's contenders already are in championship form.
Check out our best of results, news and notes from the week that was April 23-28.
Boys Track
What a toss: Walled Lake Central junior Cullen Prena tossed the discus an incredible 187 feet, seven inches, to win the event at the Oxford Invitational by nearly 36 feet. In fact, the toss would've won every MHSAA Final dating back to 2003. Earlier in the week he broke the Oakland County record as well. He also won the shot put at Oxford. (Oakland Press)
Girls Track
South still on top: Reigning MHSAA Division 1 champion Grosse Pointe South earned a strong early win at the Michigan State Spartan Invitational ahead of a field that included annual powers Rockford and Williamston and a strong DeWitt team. Bay City Western won the boys meet. (Playmakers.com)
Baseball
Flint Final set: Goodrich’s Bob Foreback and Davison’s Timm Rye will bring more than 1,000 victories worth of experience into this season’s Greater Flint Area Baseball Tournament championship game when their teams face off on Memorial Day. The two will meet after emerging from the field this weekend. (Flint Journal)
How do you score that: Most telling lines from the Kalamazoo Gazette’s story about Comstock turning a triple play and three double plays in one game came from Comstock coach Rich Bailey: “We have not played particularly good defense. In fact, our defense has been a problem. The skill is there; the execution hasn’t been.” (Kalamazoo Gazette)
Girls Soccer
Poll position: Rochester Adams continued to affect the Division 1 rankings while moving up itself. Adams likely helped to knock rival Rochester out of this week’s honorable mentions with a 2-0 win Thursday. The Friday before, Adams downed then top-ranked Troy 4-1. The Highlanders have opened 7-0 and are ranked No. 3 in Division 1. (Oakland Press)
Boys Basketball
Flint Powers coach moves on: Tim Herman led the Flint Powers Catholic boys basketball program only seven seasons, but they were seven of the Chargers’ most memorable. Herman resigned his post last week after more than 100 wins and the team’s only MHSAA championship, in Class B in 2009. (Flint Journal)
Football
Michigan's finest take next step: At least nine former MHSAA athletes were drafted by NFL teams (by my count) over seven rounds Thursday through Saturday. They were:
- DE Nick Perry (Detroit Martin Luther King/University of Southern California) Green Bay, first round
- DT Mike Martin (Detroit Catholic Central/University of Michigan) Tennessee, third round
- QB Kirk Cousins (Holland Christian/Michigan State University) Washington, fourth round
- WR Keshawn Martin (Westland John Glenn/Michigan State University) Houston, fourth round
- CB Chris Greenwood (Detroit Martin Luther King/Albion College) Detroit, fifth round
- S Trenton Robinson (Bay City Central/Michigan State) San Francisco, sixth round
- LB Audie Cole (Monroe/North Carolina State University) Minnesota, seventh round
- RB Edwin Baker (Oak Park/Michigan State University) San Diego, seventh round
- K John Potter (Grand Haven/Western Michigan University) New York Jets, seventh round
Editor's note: Did we miss something? Comment below and tell us about it. Is there an event coming up that we should make sure to note? Comment or e-mail [email protected].
Kearsley Boys Sent Coach Into Retirement with 4th-Straight Championship
By
Keith Dunlap
Special for MHSAA.com
February 27, 2026
WATERFORD — Flint Kearsley boys bowling coach Bart Rutledge said he thought for years that he would retire once his son Trent graduated.
That actually happened last year, but Rutledge decided to come back for one more.
“We had six seniors coming back, and I knew them since they were freshman,” Rutledge said. “I didn’t want to hand them off. I wanted to finish it with them.”
Kearsley certainly finished it, sending Rutledge off to retirement with the best gift possible.
For the fourth straight year, Kearsley won the Division 2 team title, sweeping New Boston Huron in what was the third meeting in four years between the teams in the championship match. Kearsley won all three.
“The feeling gets better every single year,” Kearsley senior anchor bowler Jameson Vanier said. “I don’t know how to describe it.”
Rutledge said Kearsley was consistently solid as a team all year, not placing below third at any tournament all season. However, the team also didn’t win a tournament until its last one of the regular season.
“It took a while to get the communication going and everything,” Rutledge said. “There could’ve been a little bit of a letdown (from last year). It’s tough. It’s hard doing back-to-back, let alone four.”
Kearsley was seeded second out of the qualifying block and then beat Three Rivers in the Quarterfinals and St. Clair Shores Lake Shore in the Semifinals.
Kearsley then ran into the familiar New Boston Huron foe in the Final, although Chiefs head coach Larry Collins said his team didn’t initially think it had advanced past the qualifying block.
Collins said his bowlers were at a nearby Culver’s for lunch and he planned to stick around and support neighboring school Carleton Air[port, which was the top seed out of qualifying.
Much to his surprise, Collins found out his team had qualified by 22 pins as the No. 8 seed, and had to call back his bowlers from Culver’s to get ready for the Quarterfinal match.
“I stuck around to watch Airport, and next thing you know we are bowling Airport,” Collins said.
New Boston Huron then knocked off Airport in the Quarterfinals and Tecumseh in the Semifinals to earn another crack at Kearsley.
After a five-game thriller last year, Kearsley was in control from the start this time, winning 176-138, 205-149, 190-128.
Despite another loss to Kearsley, Collins wasn’t unhappy at all with how his team competed.
“This one is special,” Collins said. “We weren’t expected to do much this year. We lost a lot of seniors from last year. We thought we were dead. Kids were at Culver’s getting lunch and all of a sudden they made the announcement that they made the cut and came flying back over. We shot 980 in the last game (of qualifying) and it vaulted us ahead. We got to bowl Airport in our region and in our league, and that’s a phenomenal team. Our boys just stepped up and said that we weren’t going to lose to them again.”