Today in the MHSAA: 10/24/18
October 24, 2018
By Geoff Kimmerly
Second Half editor
Each weekday of the school year, we break down the top headlines courtesy of Michigan’s sports media.
Boys Soccer Regionals kicked off Tuesday with a series of upsets, while a few more volleyball teams clinched west side or Upper Peninsula league championships.
1. Boys Soccer: Unranked East Kentwood dealt No. 7 Midland Dow its first and only loss, 1-0 in a Division 1 Regional Semifinal – Midland Daily News
2. Boys Soccer: Unranked Grand Blanc scored in the closing minutes to eliminate No. 8 Brighton in Division 1, 2-1 – WJRT
3. Boys Soccer: Unranked Warren DeLaSalle won the shootout to get past No. 4 Berkley 2-1 in Division 1 – C&G Newspapers
4. Boys Soccer: No. 9 Bloomfield Hills Cranbrook Kingswood shut out No. 7 Fenton to advance in Division 2 – Oakland Press
5. Boys Soccer: No. 3 Kalamazoo Hackett won a matchup of ranked teams in Division 4, 5-0 over No. 8 Hartford – JoeInsider.com
6. Volleyball: Iron Mountain swept Ishpeming Westwood to add a Western Peninsula Athletic Conference title to its Mid-Peninsula Conference shared championship – Iron Mountain Daily News
7. Volleyball: Division 2 No. 7 Hamilton clinched a share of the Ottawa-Kent Conference Green title with a sweep of Hudsonville Unity Christian – Holland Sentinel
8. Volleyball: Saugatuck clinched the Southwestern Athletic Conference Lakeshore title with a sweep of Martin – Holland Sentinel
9. Boys Soccer: Division 1 No. 10 Ann Arbor Skyline held off Canton 1-0 in Division 1 – We Love Ann Arbor
10. Boys Soccer: Tecumseh’s goal three minutes into overtime was the game winner in its 2-1 Division 2 win over Hamtramck – Adrian Daily Telegram
Also of note …
Volleyball: From Saturday, Division 3 No. 2 Bronson clinched its second straight Big 8 Conference title with a sweep of the league tournament – Coldwater Daily Reporter
Linked Up: 10/28/11
October 28, 2011
Each week I'll post links to stories that interest me most during my travels in online sports land. I was going to wait for next week for this first installment, but these seemed worthy of telling you about now.
See something high school sports-related that you think others would find valuable? Send me a link.
These two teams provide multiple reasons why 8-player football has been such a strong addition -- most notably, it is providing our smallest schools with an opportunity to still play football despite fewer players, and succeed. The sport took off in this state in 2009, and this weekend mark the start of the first MHSAA 8-player Tournament. Akron-Fairgrove will play its first postseason game since 1992, while Owendale-Gagetown will play its first since 1979.
Olivet's Peters coaching his heart out (Battle Creek Enquirer)
I covered Olivet and coach Dean Peters for more than a decade, including during last season's first-ever Eagles run to the MHSAA football finals. One of the great people in high school coaching, he needed emergency double-bypass surgery earlier this month but is back in the coaching booth. Olivet faces Lansing Catholic in a Pre-District game.
Megan Hubbard a standout for Hanover-Horton cross country (Jackson Citizen-Patriot)
This is a neat story about a runner who is second-best on her team and has never won a race -- but also is likely the second-best to ever run at her school. Usually, we hear only about who finishes first.
Standley Lake football player Rhett Gutierrez overcomes eye disease (The Denver Post)
Almost always, links I post will be Michigan-related. But this story is just incredible. We've seen athletes with different degrees of vision impairment do incredible things in high school athletics. But this is the first time I've heard of someone overcoming that obstacle to play quarterback for his football team.