Special Year Thanks to No Specialization
August 7, 2015
By Geoff Kimmerly
Second Half editor
As we embark on another sports-filled school year Monday, we can look to a recent Monroe St. Mary Catholic Central grad for the value of a school year filled with sports.
As specialization at the highs school level continues to be debated, Bryce Windham will start his college baseball career this fall at Division I Old Dominion University – after playing baseball but also football and basketball for the Falcons.
The MHSAA has long advocated athletes taking on as many sports as they have interest instead of focusing on just one in pursuit of a college scholarship – a position that’s received plenty of public backing of late, be it from stars of the U.S. women’s soccer team after their World Cup championship run or former Lansing Waverly multi-sport athlete John Smoltz during his enshrinement in the Major League Baseball Hall of Fame.
Enter Windham – who easily could’ve been excused for focusing on baseball, or even basketball as his dad is the St. Mary’s varsity boys coach. Instead, Bryce quarterbacked the football team to last season’s Division 6 championship – breaking Ithaca’s national-best 69-game winning streak in the Final – before being named Class C Player of the Year by The Associated Press in basketball and earning a Most Valuable Player honor at the baseball state coaches association all-star game at Comerica Park this spring.
All three of Windham's teams reached at least the MHSAA Quarterfinals.
“His participation in football and basketball helped land a Division 1 baseball scholarship to Old Dominion. They were able to see his athleticism in basketball and toughness in football, and ODU’s coach loved it,” dad and hoops coach Randy Windham said.
“He probably would’ve given up football, and that ended up his greatest memory by winning a state championship.”
Click to read about Windham’s multitude of accomplishments as reported last month by the Monroe Evening News.
Honors Abound
National coaching honors were bestowed on a trio of Michigan coaches over the summer:
- Retired Trenton ice hockey coach Mike Turner – the winningest hockey coach in MHSAA history with a record of 629-126-52 from 1974-81 and then 1995-2014 – was named National Coach of the Year in Special Sports by the National High School Athletic Coaches Association. His teams won 11 MHSAA titles and finished runner-up four times. “I was there when the MHSAA added hockey as one of their sanctioned sports and crowned their first MHSAA state championships in 1975. At that time there were 60-70 high school teams participating, and now there are 170,” Turner said. “It has been great to be a part of the advancements made in the sport of high school hockey, with more teams participating, more player development, and more opportunities that exist for players after high school.”
- Traverse City Central boys track and field and cross country coach John Lober won his second national coaching honor of the 2014-15 school year, named the NHSACA Coach of the Year for track and field to go with a previous honor earned in January from the National Federation of State High School Associations. He has coached the Traverse City Central boys track and field team since 1977 and also the boys cross country team since 1989. His 1992 track team won the Class A championship, and he has coached 17 individual MHSAA Finals champions. He was inducted into the Michigan Interscholastic Track Coaches Association Hall of Fame in 2006.
- Ann Arbor Pioneer assistant girls swimming and diving coach Liz Hill was named the Assistant Coach of the Year for all girls sports by the NHSACA. Hill, a former All-American at the University of Michigan and standout sprinter at Pioneer, began assisting her husband Denny Hill in 1983 before becoming his fulltime assistant a few seasons later. Together they’ve led the Pioneers girls to 15 MHSAA team titles, the last two as co-head coaches.
Michigan Mourns
Fremont and the high school athletic community statewide mourned the death July 21 of longtime coach Rich Tompkins, who led Fremont’s boys cross country teams to six MHSAA cross country championships including three and a runner-up finish during his last decade of coaching before retiring in 1997.
The Muskegon Chronicle reported that his boys and girls cross country teams and boys track and field team combined for 45 league championships, with his boys cross country team winning 116 straight duals from 1977-88. Tompkins was executive director of the Michigan High School Coaches Association for more than a decade and served on its board for more than two decades.
Click to read more from the Chronicle on Tompkins’ legacy.
Officials in the News
The Monroe County Officials Association took to the county fair to encourage passers-by to “Be the Referee” – and received 47 sign-ups from people interested in the avocation. Visitors to an MCOA booth at the fair were told in some detail what is involved with being an MHSAA official, and those who then signed up to find out more about officiating football, basketball, baseball or softball (sports the MCOA trains for and schedules) will be invited to an orientation session where they will become eligible for one of 20 complimentary registration fees for this school year.
The West Michigan Officials Association marked a decade of support at the start of this summer for the Visually Impaired Sports and Activity Day, sponsored by the Helen DeVos Children’s Foundation. The WMOA has contributed nearly $18,000 to the event over the last 10 years as well as taking part in the event, which includes a number of sports and other activities.
The Saginaw Athletic Officials Association sent along this photo of five members who worked 2013-14 MHSAA Finals, from left: Mark Jarlock (baseball), Tom Behmlander (softball), Scott Helmka (football), Dale Brown (softball and football) and Mark Schoenow (football). The Baseball Final was Jarlock’s first; the other officials had worked Finals in the past.
PHOTO: (Top) Monroe St. Mary quarterback Bryce Windham unloads a pass during last season's Division 6 Final win over Ithaca at Ford Field.
Pioneer Earns 31st State Championship to Complete Sport's Inaugural MHSAA Tournament
By
Keith Dunlap
Special for MHSAA.com
October 25, 2025
NORTHVILLE – If there were ever a situation where one state championship seemed greater than 30 previous ones, this was it for the Ann Arbor Pioneer field hockey program.
Over its first 45 years as a program, Pioneer won 30 state championships while the sport was sanctioned by the Michigan High School Field Hockey League.
With this 46th year for the Pioneers the first for field hockey with MHSAA sponsorship, they certainly had a weight of expectations as the team to beat with their storied history and fact they entered the postseason as the No. 1 overall seed.
But none of that additional pressure slowed down Pioneer, which made history as the MHSAA’s inaugural Finals champion in field hockey with a 2-0 win over Southeastern Conference rival Dexter on Saturday at Tom Holzer Field.
“I always tell the athletes that pressure, you can use it to your advantage,” said longtime Pioneer head coach Jane Nixon, who completed her 27th season as head coach. “It helps you focus, and it gives you energy. I never think of pressure as a bad thing, but as kind of a good thing.”
The biggest reason Pioneer (15-6-1) added to its championship collection was the strength of its defense.
Pioneer and freshman goalie Mara Boullion didn’t give up a single goal during the entire MHSAA Tournament, and thwarted all 10 penalty corner opportunities Dexter earned during the championship game.
Boullion stopped all seven shots from the Dreadnaughts (15-4-4).
“It was just a lot of grit and a lot of heart,” Nixon said. “Just sticking with it and persevering through the hard stuff. Really proud of our defensive effort and our goalkeeping.”
Pioneer opened the scoring with 4:03 remaining in the first quarter on a goal by junior Zoe Shuchman.
Following a Pioneer penalty corner, there was a mad scramble in front of the Dexter goal, where Zoe Shuchman managed to get a strong enough piece of the ball to put it across the line and net.
Pioneer went up 2-0 with 2:47 remaining in the third quarter on a Dexter turnover deep in its own territory. An errant pass was intercepted by Pioneer senior Maggie Lamb, who broke in all alone on the Dexter goal and put away the chance.
It was her 10th goal of the season.
“We felt a lot (of pressure),” Lamb said of Pioneer’s tournament run. “We were also trying to go into it a game at a time and not thinking too far ahead. Just making sure we played our best game until we reached this ultimate end game.”
This was the third game of the season between Pioneer and Dexter. The teams played to a 1-1 tie on Sept. 15 before Pioneer earned a 1-0 win in the second game Sept. 22.
Like Pioneer, Dexter also is a storied program, having won MHSFHL Division 2 state titles in 2022 and 2023 and five overall.
Dexter was making its fourth-straight championship game appearance after losing in last year’s MHSFHL Division 2 final and had spurts throughout the game where it carried play.
Dexter ended up outshooting Pioneer, 9-7. Unfortunately for the Dreadnaughts, it couldn’t crack Pioneer’s stout defense.
“Sometimes it’s just a matter of a lucky break,” said Dexter head coach Keely Tamer. “They’re a talented team, and I knew we were going to have to play hard to get the ball in. It just didn’t happen today. We have the talent to score. It just wasn’t there today.”
PHOTOS (Top) Ann Arbor Pioneer's Maggie Lamb (7) and her teammates raise their championship trophy Saturday after clinching the first MHSAA Finals title in the sport. (Middle) Pioneer's Violet Soldan (10) prepares to move the ball ahead while Dexter's Claire Dubuque defends. (Below) Pioneer's Izzy Sutton (15). and Mara Buillon (35) defend their goal with Dexter's Allison St. Amour (9) and Kylie Marcinkowski working to find an opening.