Ramping Up for Prepapalooza 2014
May 27, 2014
By Geoff Kimmerly
Second Half editor
Over the next five days, thousands of teams representing more than 700 MHSAA high schools will compete for championships at the District, Regional and Finals levels in 11 sports in what annually is the busiest week in Michigan high school sports.
MHSAA.com and Second Half are the places to be for results, coverage and live video from championship events all over both Peninsulas.
Total, 26 Finals champions will be crowned in girls and boys tennis, girls and boys track and field and Upper Peninsula girls and boys golf, with 36 Regional champions rewarded in girls and boys lacrosse and Lower Peninsula boys golf and 320 winners earning trophies in softball, baseball and girls soccer. All tournament rounds combined, more than 8,000 medals will be presented to individual winners or contributors on those team champions.
Game scores as they are reported for baseball, softball, soccer and lacrosse will be available on the MHSAA Score Center throughout the week. Full results from golf Regionals also will be posted over the next five days, as will Finals tennis and golf results as we receive them from Lower and Upper Peninsula hosts (Lower Peninsula tennis opening rounds late Friday evening). Track and Field Finals results will be posted Saturday evening.
All MHSAA Finals from both peninsulas will be covered with stories and photos on Second Half by a crew of valuable correspondents from around the state. Second Half will continue its coverage at the Lacrosse and LP Boys Golf Finals on June 14 and the Baseball, Softball and Girls Soccer Finals from June 19-21.
Live championship races from all seven sites of MHSAA Track and Field Finals will be available on a subscription basis on MHSAA.TV, beginning with the 3,200-meter relays at 10 a.m. at each site. The rest of the Upper Peninsula races then will continue, with Lower Peninsula championship races beginning again at 1 p.m. Highlights from this week's golf and tennis championship events will debut on MHSAA.TV in July.
PHOTOS: (Top) Runners push toward the finish during the 2013 LP Division 3 Final. (Middle) Members of the Bloomfield Hills Academy of the Sacred Heart tennis team hold up number ones to signify their place at last season's LP Division 4 Final.
Roell's Dominating Run Keys Sentinels' Surge to 5th-Straight UP Finals Championship
By
Jason Juno
Special for MHSAA.com
February 21, 2026
MARQUETTE — Marquette junior Kaytlin Roell said she was a little nervous going into Saturday’s Upper Peninsula Swimming & Diving Finals. She didn’t mention it being the biggest meet of the year – rather the two snow days leading up to such a massive event meant two days of no training.
She was determined to keep her mind where it needed to be, something she did from start to finish. She edged last year’s champion, Allison Deuter, by six hundredths of a second in the 50-yard freestyle and later won the 100 butterfly while also helping Marquette to first-place finishes in the 200 and 400 freestyle relays.
“Last year wasn’t my greatest year,” Roell said. “I think I could have done better. This year, I put my mind to it.”
Roell had some big wins, and so did her team. The Sentinels won their fifth-straight U.P. title, 311-226.5 over runner-up Houghton.
“When I first stepped out for my first race, the 50 free, I focused, and I felt ready and I felt I spent this whole year training for this moment,” Roell said. She finished in 25.74 seconds. “When I came in and I won, I was ecstatic. I was so happy since I haven’t really had the chance to be on the podium, on the top individually, since my freshman year.”
The day got better.
“When I swam my 100 fly, I went crazy. I shaved almost three seconds off my personal best,” Roell said. Her time of 1:00.93 put her just three hundredths of a second from the school record, something she can shoot for as a senior.
“That 100 butterfly was electric,” Marquette coach Nathan McFarren said.
She swam the 50-yard opening leg of the 200 relay faster than she finished in the individual event at 25.66 seconds.
“Having everybody put in the work together and winning the 200 free was amazing. It brought so much joy to me,” she said. The relay’s winning time was 1:46.96.
The Sentinels beat Houghton in the 400 in 4:00.70 despite being seeded behind the Gremlins.
“The thing about Kaytlin is she’s matured so much,” McFarren said. “She’s become a great team player, and she works her butt off.”
Deuter, a sophomore, repeated as a U.P. champion, but not in the 50 like last year. After finishing second in that race by such a close margin, she went out and won the 100 freestyle in 57.33 seconds.
“It just felt good winning finally,” she said, “because all my early mornings and late nights I put in swimming and lifting and whatnot finally paid off.”
Her coach, Jim Lindstrom, said she doesn’t miss a practice. Even if school is canceled and they can’t have practice, she goes to the Y anyway.
“She’s been swimming since she was 6 years old,” he said. “She’s really determined.”
And she’s an overall good swimmer, he said. She could have won an individual medley race if the team didn’t need her to be in the 50 freestyle, he said.
She also helped the 200 medley relay to a win (1:59.31).
Marquette’s Hailee LaCombe referenced the time she put in as well after she won the 100 backstroke in 1:09.58.
“I’m a senior, so it’s my last meet. I’ve been swimming for 13 years,” she said. “I was just thinking of making sure all my hard work throughout the year got put into those races.”
She beat teammate Lola Sved by just over a second.
“I had a good start and everything,” LaCombe said. “My turns were good, my underwater, I tried to do good breakouts and everything.”
Sault Ste. Marie sophomore Isabeau Woodard won the 100 breaststroke in 1:16.32.
“When I got in the water, my goggles instantly filled with water,” she said.
She remembered thinking she should have gone without the cap and goggles. “It would have been so much better,” Woodard added. “I don’t even remember the last 25 (yards). I remember I couldn’t breathe and I was scared.”
She couldn’t believe her time. She didn’t even know she won.
“I found out when my sister texted. She was like, ‘Oh, by the way, you got first place,’” Woodard said.
Being a U.P. champion is a “new feeling,” she said. “Last year, I did not do so hot. I was fifth last year, I think. It’s really surreal.”
Gladstone’s Irene Neumeier won the 200 freestyle in 2:06.73, Westwood’s Kamryn LaVigne took first in the 200 IM (2:30.96), and Houghton’s Ava Keteri won the 500 freestyle (6:08.42).
McFarren’s daughter, Logan, took second in the 100 and 200 freestyle events.
“This one was extra special to me,” he said. “She put in so much work this year, and it paid off.”
PHOTOS (Top) Marquette celebrates its victory Saturday in the 200 freestyle relay. (Middle) The Sentinels’ Kaytlin Roell powers to a win in the 100 butterfly. (Click for more by Jarvinen Photos.)