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1975 Class D Football Film Finds Way Back to MHSAA for All to Enjoy Again

By John Johnson
MHSAA Communications Director emeritus

April 11, 2023

Chasing history was one of the most enjoyable parts of serving at the MHSAA for nearly 34 years. Researching information, but especially what I considered for a long time to be talking to the “old guys” (now I’m one of them) and soaking up their verbal histories of our games.

It also involved chasing down old photos, broadcasts and game films – especially those which preceded our more modern video era beginning in the 1990s.

When I arrived at the MHSAA in 1987, there was a shelf of old 16mm film canisters of an assortment of Boys Basketball Finals from the 1950s to the 70s – certainly not a complete set. The Association would shoot some game action from each quarter and the trophy presentations. They’d be sent out to the participating schools to show to the students (I remember watching a Mt. Pleasant Sacred Heart game in 1967 when I was in fifth grade). Some would find their way back to the office – most would not.

Will Robinson, the legendary Detroit Public School League coach who led Pershing High School to the league’s first MHSAA titles (in 1967 and 1970) after a district-imposed hiatus from 1931-61 from statewide tournaments, would pull my chain every time we saw each other about those games featuring Spencer Haywood and Ralph Simpson, among others. We never found them.

So it became a project to try and track down as many old game films of state championships as we could.

Any conversation with someone with a history tone always included a question about the whereabouts of a game film or video. One of those recently bore fruit.

When Crystal Falls Forest Park played in the 8-Player Football Finals at the Superior Dome in Marquette back in 2017, I spent a lot of time talking with living legend Bill Santilli, who led the Trojans to the Class D crown in the very first year of the tournament in 1975, and who would later coach the school to a second state title (2007) and serve as athletic director. He said he had a box on his desk collecting dust that he didn’t know what to do with – that box contained an old video tape from that game.

I uttered four little words – “Send It To Me.”

Posing with the championship trophy after the 1975 Class D Football Final are (left to right): Forest Park tight end Bryan LaChapelle, quarterback Richard Mettlach, head coach Dick Mettlach and running back Bill Santilli.After a while the tape arrived in East Lansing, and I got our video production friends at When We Were Young Productions/Rush Media in Wisconsin on it. This winter, they found someone who could convert it and sent me a file that was recently posted to the MHSAASPORTS Channel on YouTube. You can watch the Trojans play Flint Holy Rosary by Clicking Here or watching above.

There are all kinds of old game films/videos and artifacts in attics, closets, garages, etc., in every town.  Two of our Muskegon historians – Ron Pesch, the MHSAA’s history guy; and the old broadcaster, Jim Moyes, who called games on the radio for years in the Port City – can tell stories of their own about discoveries they have made. Moyes found all kinds of mementos while working on his book on the history of high school track & field in Michigan, and sitting with Ron at this year’s Girls Basketball Finals, he told a story of finding the mother lode of photographs from one of his other historical passions – silent film star Buster Keaton – who spent ten summers in the Actor’s Colony in Muskegon.

Pesch found a listing for Eleanor Keaton, Buster’s widow, using a telephone book (remember those?), made a phone call and shortly thereafter, on a vacation to California, was in her living room where he was loaned a photo album and family scrapbook containing all kinds of images from their time in Muskegon. Many of those images appear in a soon-to-be-released documentary, while the album and scrapbook now reside in the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences library in Beverly Hills, Calif. You can preview the film by Clicking Here.

So if you think you have something of a state championship that could be utilized on a bigger platform and enjoyed by everyone, drop a note to [email protected]. If something needs to be converted to a more modern format, you’ll get a copy back, and the footage will be eventually viewable on the MHSAA’s YouTube channel.

To help guide your search, think in the following terms:

► Just about anything before 1990. But there are gaps during the 90s that need to be filled as well.

► Only Championship games and Semifinal games, unless something momentous occurred (like Richie Jordan’s 60-point game for Fennville against Bridgman in a Regional Semifinal in 1965, which is still an  all-time tournament single-game record for boys basketball).

► For a list of what’s in the MHSAA archives prior to 2000 – Click Here. A long-term project is to get all of the games on the list and up to about 2010 uploaded to the YouTube channel. Most games from 2013-14 on can be viewed on the NFHS Network, and some games between 2010 and 2013 are available for purchase as DVDs from PrepFilms.com.

PHOTO Posing with the championship trophy after the 1975 Class D Football Final are (left to right): Forest Park tight end Bryan LaChapelle, quarterback Richard Mettlach, head coach Dick Mettlach and running back Bill Santilli.

More Championships Come to MHSAA TV

October 31, 2017

By John Johnson
MHSAA Director of Broadcast Properties 

Championship action in two sports plus the second week of PrepZone gridiron coverage will provide fans of MHSAA action lots to choose from this weekend.

Coverage begins with four District Final games in the MHSAA Football Playoffs – powered by the Michigan Army National Guard – on the PrepZone on FoxSportsDetroit.com and FOX Sports GO! on Friday (Nov. 3) at 7 p.m.:

  • Canton at Belleville (Div. 1)
  • Grand Rapids Catholic Central at Wyoming Kelloggsville (Div. 4)
  • River Rouge at Chelsea  (Div. 4 – Also available on FOX Sports Detroit Facebook page)
  • Pewamo-Westphalia at New Lothrop (Div. 7) 

On Saturday (Nov. 4), the four championship games of the Lower Peninsula Boys Soccer Tournament will have live streaming video on MHSAA.tv and live streaming audio on MHSAANetwork.com, and the Finish Line Cam at Michigan International Speedway returns at the L.P. Cross Country Finals on MHSAA.tv.

All four PrepZone games feature clashes of highly-ranked teams in the final Associated Press polls for 2017. Belleville was ranked second and Canton ninth in the final Division 1 poll; Grand Rapids Catholic Central and Wyoming Kelloggsville were 1-2 in Division 4; River Rouge and Chelsea were 7-8 in the final Division 3 poll; and New Lothrop finished the season atop the Division 7 rankings with Pewamo-Westphalia in third.

The River Rouge at Chelsea game will receive bonus coverage, streaming live on the Fox Sports Detroit Facebook page. That game drew 49 percent of the votes in a Twitter poll conducted Monday.

All PrepZone games will be archived on MHSAA.tv.

Saturday’s Boys Soccer Finals will be live on MHSAA.tv with games at Noon and 3 p.m. The games will be played at Rochester Hills Stoney Creek and Comstock Park High Schools, with divisions at each site to be announced after the Semifinals on Wednesday (Nov. 1). All of the games will also have live streaming audio at MHSAANetwork.com.

One Soccer Semifinal game will be Live on MHSAA.tv on Wednesday – a Division 3 matchup at Cedar Springs between Ludington and Grand Rapids South Christian, at 6 p.m.

MHSAA.tv will also offer a free live video stream on Saturday of the finish line at the Lower Peninsula Cross Country Finals at Michigan International Speedway. The stream will include audio commentary from announcers around the course throughout each race.  The morning session with the boys and girls races in Division 3 and 4 begins at 9:30 a.m., and the afternoon session with races in Divisions 1 and 2 starts at 1:30 p.m. Live timing of each race will also be available on the Cross Country page of the MHSAA Website.

A month’s subscription to watch live on MHSAA.tv is $9.95 and allows access to the full schedule of MHSAA Tournaments during the month of November:

  • Nov. 4 – Boys Soccer Finals
  • Nov. 11 – Selected Football Playoff Regional Finals
  • Nov. 16-17 – Girls Volleyball Semifinals & Finals
  • Nov. 18 – Lower Peninsula Girls Swimming & Diving Finals
  • Nov. 18 – Football Playoff Semifinals (12 games) 

Live coverage of Football District Finals and Girls Volleyball District games also takes place this week on MHSAA.tv, being produced by SBP schools:

In its ninth year, the School Broadcast Program gives members an opportunity to showcase excellence in their schools by creating video programming of athletic and non-athletic events, with students gaining skills in announcing, camera operation, directing/producing and graphics. Pixellot is used by schools wishing to stream games but which lack the ability to staff the events. The SBP program also gives schools the opportunity to raise money through advertising and viewing subscriptions.

All sporting events – Live or On-Demand - are available on a subscription basis only for their first 72 hours online. They become available for free, on-demand viewing approximately 72 hours following their completion.

A complete list of participating schools can be found on the School Broadcast Program page of the MHSAA website.

A weekly staple on the MHSAA.tv website and the MHSAASports Channel on YouTube is back for another year with highlights of selected games last week produced by members of the Association’s School Broadcast Program. 

This week’s highlights package consists of clips from Pre-District football games Parma Western at Haslett and Oscoda at Breckenridge, and a boys soccer Regional Final match with Petoskey at East Lansing.

Schools interested in becoming a part of the School Broadcast Program should contact John Johnson at the MHSAA Office.

More than 15 football games are featured each week on the State Champs! Sports Network Extra Point – powered by the Michigan High School Athletic Association – Saturday at 10 a.m. on FOX Sports Detroit.

The half-hour program features highlights from more than a dozen games each week, including clips from games produced by MHSAA School Broadcast Program members. The program airs multiple times each weekend on FOX Sports Detroit and on Comcast Channel 900, and will be archived on the State Champs YouTube Channel. Consult your local listings for additional playback times.

Here are some of the games to be featured this week on State Champs! Extra Point:

  • Canton at Belleville
  • Macomb Dakota at Clinton Township Chippewa Valley
  • Warren DeLaSalle at Port Huron Northern
  • Grand Rapids Catholic Central at Wyoming Kelloggsville
  • River Rouge at Chelsea
  • Grant at Muskegon Oakridge
  • Kent City at Montague
  • Laingsburg at Ithaca
  • Pewamo-Westphalia at Ithaca
  • Petersburg-Summerfield at Ottawa Lake-Whiteford
  • Morrice at Deckerville

PLUS - Additional coverage from Grand Rapids, Lansing, Flint, Upper Peninsula and School Broadcast Program games.

The MHSAA also has a presence on other State Champs! Network programs throughout each weekend. The MHSAA Minute is a weekly part of the State Champs! High School Sports Show on FOX Sports Detroit at 9 a.m. every Sunday – with multiple replays on FOX Sports Detroit and Comcast Channel 900 throughout the week. That program also is archived on the State Champs YouTube Channel. Consult your local listings for additional playback times.

This week’s MHSAA Minute on State Champs talks about The Scholar-Athlete Award.

The MHSAA also has content on the State Champs Scoreboard! High School Football Radio Show on Friday nights during the football and basketball seasons, originating on WXYT-FM (97.1) in Detroit and carried on more than 10 radio stations across the state. This Week In High School Sports and Be the Referee are weekly features on the program.