MHSAA Historian Picks 10 to Remember
August 9, 2016
By Rob Kaminski
MHSAA benchmarks editor
It sounded simple and fun, the theme for the MHSAA's spring issue of benchmarks: a history of MHSAA tournaments.
It certainly was the latter, but simple? Not so much.
There’s no way to do justice to nearly a century’s worth of history in some sports. Complicating matters was the abundance of information and photographs for some, and the scant amount of detailed data and images for others.
MHSAA historian Ron Pesch was given an equally challenging task: recount a “Top 10” list from his days covering various MHSAA Finals. He shares them here and, he adds, they are in no order of favorites.
The Shot: 1986 Class B Boys Basketball Final at Crisler Arena – Saginaw Buena Vista’s Chris Coles’ desperation shot, launched at the buzzer from well beyond half court, dropped through the hoop to give the Knights a 33-32 win over defending champion Flint Beecher in a rematch of the 1985 Class B title game. The shot was Coles’ first of the second half and his only points in the contest.
The Smurfs: 1986 Class A Football Final at the Pontiac Silverdome – The "Smurfs" – Muskegon Coach Dave Taylor's nickname for his small, quick swarming defensive linemen – limited heavily favored Sterling Heights Stevenson to four yards rushing and 73 yards of total offense in a 10-0 win. As a 1979 graduate of Muskegon High School, I was elated.
The Drive: 1989 Class B Football Final at the Pontiac Silverdome – I slid down from the press box into the stands at the Silverdome for the end of this one. With 2:20 remaining, the atmosphere was simply electric, as Farmington Hills Harrison’s lauded quarterback Mill Coleman took the reins with his team down 27-21 to DeWitt. The senior executed a flawless two-minute drill, guiding his team to the DeWitt 9 before scampering into the end zone for the tying points. Steve Hill added his fourth PAT for the lead, then secured the victory with an interception on the next series.
King Kool: 2005 Class B Boys Basketball Final, Breslin Center, East Lansing – David Kool was a flawless 20 for 20 from the free-throw line and scored 43 points as Grand Rapids South Christian downed Muskegon Heights 67-60.
The Parade: 2004 Individual Wrestling Finals, The Palace of Auburn Hills – In 2004, I traveled to Auburn Hills to watch the MHSAA Individual Wrestling Finals for the first time. The pageantry of the Grand March, the skills on display, the roar of the massive crowd, and the ensuing beauty and chaos of a wrestling extravaganza of this scale is truly a sight to see.
A Marathon: 2007 Division 3 Football Final, Ford Field, Detroit – East Grand Rapids and Orchard Lake St. Mary’s ended regulation tied 14-14, and this would turn into a five overtime battle that required an extra hour of play. No previous football playoff game, from Districts up, had ever gone beyond four overtimes. After exchanging field goals, touchdowns, extra points and two-point conversions, East Grand Rapids emerged with a 46-39 victory.
Tawana Towers: 1994 Class A Girls Basketball Final at Kellogg Arena, Battle Creek – Flint Northern, coached by Leteia Hughley and led by 6-4 freshman Tawana McDonald, defeated 1993 runner-up Detroit Martin Luther King, 46-32, for the Class A championship. McDonald batted down an MHSAA-record 10 shots, pulled down 13 rebounds and added five points and seven assists in a stellar performance.
Never Quit: 2008 Division 2 Football Semifinal, Spartan Stadium, East Lansing – Unbeaten, No. 1-ranked and heavily favored Muskegon trailed Davison by 22 late in the third quarter and 16 with less than five minutes to play. In perhaps the greatest comeback in playoff history, Muskegon recovered two onside kicks and scored 19 points in the final 4:31 to escape with a 38-35 victory and its third trip in five years to an MHSAA Final.
MHSAA Legends: 1998-2008 – For 10 years, the MHSAA showcased great teams from the past with their Legends of the Game series. From a historian’s perspective it was a chance to meet and learn more about folks I had often known only from the pages of microfilm. It was quite the treat to see years fall away as coaches, team managers and players reunited, in many cases for the first time after decades apart.
The MHSAA Record Books: Online, 1994 – One of my first efforts as state historian was to expand the record books beyond their primary focus on football, basketball, track & field and swimming & diving. With the arrival of the internet, an enhanced version of the record books was brought online. Coaches and fans were quick to respond with letters and e-mails, happily listing entries that had been “missed.” Soon, five category headings in a sport grew to 20, then to 50 and beyond.
Kids: 2004 Football Finals, Pontiac Silverdome – (OK, this is No. 11 ... consider it an extra point). For the first time, my sons joined me for my annual excursion to Metro Detroit for a Thanksgiving Day football weekend. They got to see the Silverdome before the move of the MHSAA Football Finals to beautiful Ford Field. Future Big Reds, they also got to see their future alma mater win another title.
PHOTOS: (Top) An MHSAA boys basketball tournament game is played at Olympia Stadium in Detroit. (Middle) Flint Northern's Tawana McDonald blocks a shot during the 1994 Class A Final.
SMCC's Windhams Agree to Coach Together - 'Us or Nothing' - Then Win It All
By
Doug Donnelly
Special for MHSAA.com
November 26, 2024
When Monroe St. Mary Catholic Central was down to needing just one point to clinch the Division 3 volleyball championship Saturday, assistant coach Randy Windham was fighting back tears.
“Just because I’m crying doesn’t mean this match is over,” Randy said in the huddle.
A few seconds later, it was over. SMCC had clinched the championship, and Randy had a front row seat to watch his wife, head coach Kim Windham, accept the trophy.
“I always call her the best coach in the family,” Randy said.
The Windhams are a coaching couple. They have been married since 1992, operate a business in Monroe together and this fall, for the first time, coached together.
It clearly was a winning combination.
When Kim was approached about coaching SMCC prior to the season, she said Randy – who has been the head boys basketball coach at SMCC since 2009 – talked her into taking the job.
“I said, ‘I’ll take it if you’ll coach,’” she said. “’If you want me to coach, then obviously you are going to coach along with me. It’s us or nothing.’ He was all in from the get-go.’”
Randy, she thought, would bring an extra element to the bench that the Kestrels needed.
“He’s so good with the mental side of things with kids,” Kim said. “I knew how much he could contribute with that. All I wanted to do was coach. I wanted to do the Xs and Os, the practice plans and teaching and let him do the rest. He’s been absolutely fabulous.”
She said having Randy near helped her, too.
“Before every match, he’s my calming force. I lean on him a lot.”
During matches, Kim said Randy was often the person talking during the huddles.
“With volleyball you only have only three minutes between sets,” she said. “You have to figure out the rotations, who is going to start, what we are going to do … so as I’m at the table figuring that out, he’s talking to the group about what just happened or what we are going to do next.
“It’s good to know he’s there taking care of things, saying the things the way I know I would want them to be said.”
While SMCC has had several deep MHSAA Tournament runs in recent years and an outstanding volleyball tradition, this year’s team did lack experience coming into the season. Windham was named head coach in May.
“We only really had three returning starters coming back,” she said. “When we started the season, the question was how we were going to get everyone else up to speed. We knew we had our work cut out for us. We had to figure out how we were going to make the puzzle pieces fit.”
Randy said he was confident Kim could get the job done.
“She’s been known to build programs,” Randy said. “It really isn’t about how good the players are, but what they will buy into. She’ll get them there. We had some good players, but she took them to the next level with her coaching.”
Kim set out to change the culture around an ultra-successful volleyball program. Early in the season, for example, the team focused on the fundamentals.
“We went back to basic fundamentals,” Kim said. “We knew if we wanted to be good, we had to be fundamentally sound first.”
Kim graduated from SMCC in 1990 after an outstanding volleyball career and went on to play two years at the college level. She launched her coaching career in 1996, only a few months after their son Bryce was born.
“I would take him with me to practice in his car seat, set him on the mat and coach,” she said.
Sports have been a common denominator for the Windham family for years.
Randy opened Monroe Sports Varsity Athletic, a screen printing and embroidery business, in 1991, a year before he and Kim were married. An assistant coach at SMCC since the 1990s, he also played professional slow-pitch softball for years. Bailey, a college volleyball player herself after playing at SMCC, lives in Indiana where she is a nurse. Bryce, who was drafted by the Chicago Cubs and played several seasons of Minor League Baseball, is working at the family business and is an assistant basketball coach at SMCC for his dad.
Kim started working full-time at the business in 2003. The day after winning the Kestrels’ most recent championship, the Windhams were back at the shop, working on filling orders.
The family bond is special.
“Randy and I just love spending time together,” Kim said. “Sometimes during basketball season Randy will be gone late or watching film. We almost get more upset when we are not together.”
Doug Donnelly has served as a sports and news reporter and city editor over 25 years, writing for the Daily Chief-Union in Upper Sandusky, Ohio from 1992-1995, the Monroe Evening News from 1995-2012 and the Adrian Daily Telegram since 2013. He's also written a book on high school basketball in Monroe County and compiles record books for various schools in southeast Michigan. E-mail him at [email protected] with story ideas for Jackson, Washtenaw, Hillsdale, Lenawee and Monroe counties.
PHOTOS (Top) Monroe St. Mary Catholic Central head volleyball coach Kim Windham, right, and assistant coach/husband Randy hold the program’s latest championship trophy. (Middle) The Windhams exchange a glance on the court at Kellogg Arena. (Top photo courtesy of the Windham family. Middle photo by Stephanie Hawkins.)