Beginning Another Tourney Journey
August 8, 2016
Below is the introductory commentary to the MHSAA's spring issue of benchmarks. Histories of MHSAA tournaments published in that issue have been appearing on Second Half every Tuesday and Friday.
By Jack Roberts
MHSAA Executive Director
Concussions and cutbacks. Participation fees and part-time employment. Student safety and specialization. International students and interstate travel. Transfers and trials.
Through a myriad of issues which periodically cloud our mission, the foundation on which the MHSAA was built still shines brightest three times each year: Tournament Time!
It can be daunting and overwhelming to make a living at this business of interscholastic athletics these days, not to mention a tad confusing. Do we need legal degrees? Medical degrees? Business degrees? Marketing degrees? There seems to be no escape from threat of legislative mandates which continually change the landscape of our product and how it’s delivered. Demands pile up, resources dwindle.
Add the daily challenges of scheduling issues, inclement weather and pleasing teenagers and their parents on a daily basis, and it’s easy to lose focus of the primary missions for the MHSAA and its member schools.
And then, scenes like this happen:
• Holly Bullough, a senior cross country runner from Traverse City St. Francis takes her second straight Division 3 championship, winning by 36.4 seconds ... with a stress fracture in her left foot.
• Detroit Martin Luther King QB Armani Posey directs a game-winning drive to give his school the Division 2 football championship ... a drive which started on his own 3-yard line with 37 seconds left and ended with a 40-yard heave to receiver Donnie Corley on the final play of the game.
• Leland sweeps the Class D volleyball title match 3-0 over Battle Creek St. Philip ... ending a string of nine straight titles for St. Phil, the 10th longest national streak in history.
• Davison’s Taylor Davis becomes only the fourth person in MHSAA Girls Bowling history to roll a 300 game in the Singles portion of the tournament ... and the first ever in the championship match.
• The Upper Peninsula’s Hancock HS wins the Division 3 ice hockey title in its first trip to the Final since 2000 ... a trip funded in part from a “Go Fund Me” web page that raised $6,620 from 99 donors in two days.
• Junior Kierra Fletcher of Warren Cousino carries her team to the Class A girls basketball championship with 27 points in the Final ... after scoring 37 of her team’s 60 points in the Semifinals and totaling 198 during eight tournament games.
That’s just a sampling of the magic from last fall and winter.
These moments shine through the current challenges and the unseen future that awaits us as they always have. The uniforms and faces are different, but the tournaments have always yielded the fruits of our labors, and the memories for our mental scrapbooks.
PHOTO: Leland's volleyball team hoists its Class D championship trophy last fall at Kellogg Arena.
Saline Tops Podium for 1st Time Since 2013 as Multiple Past Runners-Up Take Next Step
By
Steve Vedder
Special for MHSAA.com
March 15, 2025
HOLLAND – Saline boys swimming & diving coach Todd Brunty said the quest for his team’s Lower Peninsula Division 1 Finals championship Saturday began exactly 365 days ago after losing out to rival Ann Arbor Pioneer by 30 points.
"First, everyone has to believe in the opportunity or the possibility of it," he explained. "You have to be a team that expects to compete. It's the old cliché: You've got to believe you can do it.
“Three hundred and sixty five days ago, we believed we had the talent to do it. We didn't quite perform like we wanted a year ago, but coming into today we thought we had a chance."
Saline cast aside the disappointment of finishing runner-up last year by winning the team meet at Holland Aquatics Center with 291.5 points, outdistancing the 263 scored by the four-time reigning champ Pioneers. Northville was third with 224 points, Zeeland fourth at 176 and Detroit Catholic Central fifth with 175 points.
Sophomore Issac Adanin captured the 200-yard individual medley (1:48.24) and 100 breaststroke (56.23) titles to lead Saline’s scoring. Diego Valdes won the 100 butterfly (49.15) for the Hornets.
The championship was their first since winning four straight Division 1 titles from 2010-13. Saline also finished runner-up in 2016.
Last year, Adanin was runner-up in the IM and fourth in the breaststroke.
"I had a slow start (this season). It was smooth, then I gradually got faster," he said. "I really hoped I (could win both races). I was kind of young last year, so I didn't have large expectations. But I've been to a lot of big meets in club, so I learned how to get better. It was harder this year, different, because (the meet) was so stacked."
Joining Adanin as a double individual winner was Detroit Catholic Central sophomore Camren Turowski, who finished off an unbeaten season in the 50-yard freestyle by winning that event in 20.41 seconds and won the 100 free with a Division 1 meet record time of 45 seconds.
Turowski had elected to give up lacrosse and football at the middle school level a few years ago because it seemed he was always fighting injuries. "I kept getting injured, and I wanted to save my body for swimming," he said.
Now he’s putting the hurt on swim opponents. Both performances Saturday were All-America qualifying times and came on the heels of earlier this season breaking the Oakland County and Detroit Catholic Central record of 45.25 in the 100 free while setting a conference and school record of 20.69 in the 50.
A year ago Turowski, an avid wake surfer, finished runner-up at the Finals in the 50 while helping three relays place among the top two. It was that second-place finish, in fact, that Turowski credits for driving his transformation from a good swimmer into an outstanding one.
"Last year I didn't win (the 50 free), and I didn't like that," he said. "In swimming you need to improve in small increments, which means a lot. That means progress, which is what you need.
"I think it was a stronger field this year, very competitive in the 100. But I planned to win. I don't like to lose."
Detroit Catholic Central coach Jessica Stoddard said Turowski is the kind of swimmer who pays attention to coaching details, strives for perfection and is always seeking the next challenge.
"He comes in and asks what he needs to work on. He's very coachable," she said. "He's always first in and last out."
Zeeland's Owen Stevens achieved his goal Saturday by breaking the 11-year-old Division 1 Finals record in winning the 500 free (4:23.65).
Stevens, a Zeeland West senior and Finals qualifier since his freshman year who will swim at Louisville next season, last lost in the 500 free during his freshman season.
"It was my last high school race in the 500, and I wanted to go out by breaking the record and I did," he said. "It felt good. The record was in the back of my mind, and I thought if I swam my race, I could break it."
Grandville's Jack Merkel won the 100 backstroke (48.69), ending a career of rollercoaster showings at the Finals. He qualified in the backstroke as a freshman, but was slowed by the flu. He then took third in the 100 butterfly and second in the backstroke as both a sophomore and junior.
Merkel said finishing so close to a Finals championship can provide motivation, but the pressure also can raise the expectation meter.
"It can go both ways," he said. "But then I realized that if you finish second, there's only one person in the state better than you. If you're good enough to finish second, you can also win. You have to change your mindset a little bit."
Other champions were East Kentwood's Fidele Byiringiro, who became the first from his school to win diving since Kyle Gahan in 1997. He scored a 448.80.
Northville had a pair of winners with Brady Stenson in the 200 free (1:38.06) and the 400 free relay team (3:06.60). Ann Arbor Pioneer won the 200 free relay (1:24.65).
PHOTOS (Top) Saline poses with its championship trophy Saturday at Holland Aquatics Center. (Middle) Camren Turowski stands atop the podium after receiving one of his two championship medals. (Below) Saline’s Issac Adanin swims to the breaststroke championship. (Click for more from High School Sports Scene.)