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UP Swim Finals Live on MHSAA TV

February 15, 2017

By John Johnson
MHSAA Communications Director

The first of six straight weekends of live coverage of MHSAA winter sports championships begins this week on MHSAA.tv at the Upper Peninsula Swimming & Diving Finals at Marquette High School.

The Finals in diving will take place beginning at 2 p.m. Friday. On Saturday, coverage of the swimming events begins at 10 a.m.

Here’s the week-by-week NFHS Network coverage schedule of MHSAA winter Championships:

  • Feb. 17-18 – Upper Peninsula Swimming & Diving Finals
  • Feb. 24-25 – Team Dual Wrestling Quarterfinals-Semifinals-Finals
  • March 2-4 – Individual Wrestling Finals
  • March 3-4 – Girls Competitive Cheer Finals
  • March 9-11 – Ice Hockey Semifinals-Finals
  • March 11 – Lower Peninsula Boys Swimming & Diving Finals
  • March 14 – Girls Basketball Quarterfinals
  • March 16-17 – Girls Basketball Semifinals
  • March 21 – Boys Basketball Quarterfinals
  • March 23-24 – Boys Basketball Semifinals

A $9.95 subscription on the NFHS Network is good for 30 days of viewing live coverage of MHSAA.tv and a variety of high school championships across the country.  All events are available for free, on-demand viewing three days after they have been played.

New to the schedule this year are plans to live stream all 32 Girls and Boys Basketball Quarterfinals in March, many of which will be produced by members of the MHSAA’s School Broadcast Program.   

“The idea of streaming 16 games in a single day has been well-received the past few years during the Football Semifinals, and we think a lot of fans who follow high school basketball in general, but who would not be able to travel to a tournament center, will take advantage of this opportunity,” said John Johnson, MHSAA Communications Director.

With the winter regular season winding down, there’s plenty of School Broadcast Program-generated content coming in over the next seven days on MHSAA.tv including a number of events impacting conference races.

Hillman girls basketball can clinch an outright title in the North Star League Big Dipper division with a win at Rogers City on Thursday, and Birmingham Brother Rice can do the game with a win over Bloomfield Hills Cranbrook Kingswood in the Michigan Interscholastic Hockey League’s North division when those two teams meet on Friday.

Here’s this week’s MHSAA.tv schedule of live video streams available and being produced by SBP members (all times Eastern Standard):

Tuesday, Feb. 14

Wednesday, Feb. 15

Thursday, Feb. 16

Friday, Feb. 17

Saturday, Feb. 18

Tuesday, Feb. 21

Be sure to check the Upcoming Events page at MHSAA.tv for schedule additions every day.

In its eighth 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. 

The 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 portion of every subscription sold by a school goes to benefit its program. A complete list of participating schools can be found on the School Broadcast Program page of the MHSAA website.

Fans also can access scores of games in-progress on the NFHS Network website via ScoreStream. Click on the Scores button in the upper right corner.

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 includes matches from a Division 3 Individual Wrestling District at Montrose, a boys basketball game with Farmington Hills Harrison at Center Line and a girls basketball game pitting Kingsford at Marquette.

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

Montrose SBP

Ford Field Trip Gives Students Taste of Football Finals Broadcasting

By Jon Ross
MHSAA Director of Broadcast Properties

December 7, 2021

DETROIT – An hour before kickoff of the first game of 11-Player Football Finals weekend – the Division 8 championship decider between Hudson and Beal City – Bally Sports Detroit announcers Evan Stockton and Rob Rubick were busy preparing to call the action from the television booth on the third level of Ford Field.

Four levels above them, in the press box, a group of prospective broadcasters were touring the facilities. The high school students had spent the Fall sports season streaming games to the NFHS Network and now were learning about a career in broadcasting from Eric Vandefifer, a Montrose High grad currently serving as the radio voice of Saginaw Valley State University basketball and as a contributor to a variety of high school broadcast channels including the MHSAA Network.

Seven years ago, Vandefifer was in a similar situation. He was part of a field trip to Ford Field for the Finals that helped him realize sports broadcasting was a career he wanted to pursue. Those field trips were headed by Tom Skinner and Thom Lengyel, who became mentors to Vandefifer. As a high school junior in 2017, Vandefifer was named Best Student Broadcaster nationally by the NFHS Network.

Mount Pleasant SBP“With Tom Skinner now deceased and Thom Lengyel retired from the broadcast business, I just felt like I had to continue this and their legacy,” Vandefifer said. “It was important to me to keep it going because when I was in school, it was something I looked forward to.”

Nearly 50 students from Lowell, Montrose, Lake Orion, Mount Pleasant and Ann Arbor Greenhills high schools made the Nov. 26-27 trip to Ford Field. They were able to film highlights, interview players, practice announcing the games, meet other members of the press and more. For Vandefifer, giving back to students who are in the position he once was is very rewarding.

“We had the ability to feel like real media members for a day. I wanted to be able to give other students that same opportunity,” Vandefifer said. “Seeing kids who have a love for sportscasting and that drive to get better gives me real hope for the next generation in this business.”  

And after the field trips were done each day, Vandefifer put his headphones on, got behind the microphone and called the two afternoon games for the MHSAA Championship Network.

PHOTOS (Top) Eighth grader Sam Belill, left, and freshman Owen Leitelt from Montrose practice calling a game from the Ford Field press box. (Middle) Mount Pleasant make a stop at the press conference room. (Photos provided by the Montrose and Mount Pleasant School Broadcast Programs.)