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5 Ways Boyne City’s Ramblers Get Rowdy

January 18, 2017

By Geoff Kimmerly
Second Half editor

BOYNE CITY – There’s a party going on in the student section at Boyne City, and everyone’s invited.

The streets were mostly empty as we rolled into town for Friday’s Battle of the Fans VI visit – freezing temperatures probably had something to do with that, even in the heartiest of ski country. But we found a full parking lot and plenty of bustle as fans poured in for the basketball doubleheader against Kalkaska – and the Rambler Rowdies “Fright Night,” our first stop on this year’s BOTF tour.

The breakdown: The section formerly known as “Bleacher Creatures” had a pretty good tradition of cheering on Boyne City teams over the years, but interest ramped up during the 2014-15 school year when both the football and boys basketball teams advanced to MHSAA Semifinals. Last winter, with the boys basketball team set to face rival East Jordan in a Class C District Final for the third season in a row, the Rambler Rowdies were born to take support to another level. After losing to East Jordan twice during the regular season, Boyne City won 62-33 – and the section’s name, along with its newfound passion, stuck. 

On this trip, we met with seniors Tristan Stackus, Emma Vondra and Camella Zipp, and juniors Jake Kelts and Ethan Hewitt. Check out the video, followed by more of what we saw from the Rowdies. 

1. They’ve gotten everyone on board

The Rowdies claim to be a true cross-section of the school and its nearly 400 students. In a building that size, students often take part in a wide range of activities, and all are represented. In addition to athletes from other sports, the band is a regular and lined the top rows of bleachers on Friday. And while Stackus, Vondra, Kelts and Hewitt all play at least one sport – Hewitt actually plays on the basketball team – Zipp spends her time in the arts, but is just as "rowdy." The togetherness is personified when the student section enters games as one, instead of trickling into gym as individuals show up. “We’re including more people in it. Our band’s getting more involved. We have kids coming from drama that will get involved because they really like acting everything out. … (and) I feel like especially when we enter as one, it makes us more united,” Zipp said. “We’re all the same. I don’t think of myself as a drama person, or even as the basketball jock.” The section this season began choosing themes for the first time, and all have a voice; Stackus, who administers the @Rambler_Rowdy Twitter feed, gets ideas from classmates on Mondays, posts a Twitter poll so all may vote and then announces via Twitter the winner.

And here’s a spin on seniority we hadn’t heard before: The Rowdies don’t do the “seniors in front and everyone else in back thing,” which in itself isn’t that rare among our annual BOTF finalists. But the Rowdies differ in that they put freshmen near the front so they can’t hide and not cheer, filling behind them with upperclassmen to make for a stronger section front to back. In fact, Kelts led the section two years ago as a freshman – which does qualify as a rarity and no doubt has helped develop this attitude toward mixing up the classes.

2. They’re teaching marketers a thing or two

The Rowdies are selling the Boyne City brand in the hallways, and clearly it’s taken hold. The business plan started in the high school’s marketing class, taught by Tony Cutler, who has served as the architect helping student leaders get the section rolling. The buy-in has been wide-ranging, with plenty of helpers chipping in – keep an eye out in the video for all of the Rambler Rowdy/MHSAA co-branded banners advertising “Friday Night,” plus the other staging created for the event like the cemetery fence and the “R.I.P. Bad Sportsmanship” gravestones put together by additional students who put in outside time to be a part. The message also is taking root in the community – with Cutler’s help, section leaders have made connections that have resulted in local donations of everything from cowbells to head bands to spirit towels.

3. They own the airwaves

This goes with the marketing and branding discussion above, but carries enough clout to have its own point here. The Rowdies make full use of an in-school television station – the Rambler Sports Network – that rivals any in our state, regardless of size of school, with production done by students in the Visual Imaging class (known in the halls as BCVI). TVs all over campus showed eye-catching promos for Friday’s BOTF visit and gave it extra oomph. Students filmed and produced Friday’s game, and their work is now included on broadcasts by local MI News 26.

4. They’re doing it right

Kelts was quick to note the school has won 10 sportsmanship awards over the years, and doing the right thing in the stands is not just talk. In fact, we didn’t hear a negative word coming from the Rowdies the entire night. They focused on cheering their team and having fun. It was that simple, but from our point of view the 100-percent positivity certainly was noticeable.

5. They’re filling the night with fun

The Rowdies packed a lot into “Fright Night” starting with all of the themed decorations and Kelts’ take on Jason Voorhees (from the “Friday the 13th” movies) leading a section full of classmates in black from head to toe. They entered the “Wheelhouse” – their gym – together in something out of a horror movie, sprinting in from multiple directions in advance of Kelts and his chain saw (only a toy, of course). We’ve heard most chants over five years and 25 BOTF visits, but the Rowdies had a few we hadn’t heard before. And the halftime surfing by Kelts – propelled by classmates on the floor on a surfboard covered in what had to be a case of duct tape – traveled half the court and was a highlight of the night.

In their words

Focus on the game: “We didn’t really even think about Battle of the Fans,” Stackus said. “It started out as us for (the team), and now it’s come to where we’re still doing it for them but we need to get bigger. We need more people to make us better, but we’re still doing it for them.”

Players love it: “That Grayling game (a 49-44 win Dec. 13), we were down, and I hit a 3 to go ahead and the student section just erupted,” Hewitt said. “After that, not only are you playing for yourself, but you’re playing for everyone else. … The environment in the gym is totally different.”

An Up North thing: “We’re all small towns and we’re all really close together, and we are rivals with a lot of these close towns,” Vondra said. “But since we’re so small, everybody knows about everything that’s going on. So whenever you get news about something that’s happening in the school or the community, everybody automatically knows, and then they’re just that much more into it.”

Next stop on BOTF: Next up is reigning champion Traverse City West for its boys basketball game Friday, followed by visits to Charlotte (Jan. 28), Petoskey (Feb. 1) and Frankenmuth (Feb. 3).

The Battle of the Fans is sponsored in part by the United Dairy Industry of Michigan.

PHOTOS: (Top) Junior Jake Kelts, in red, leads the student section's roller coaster Friday. (Middle) Fans, some in Jason Voorhees-inspired hockey masks, chant during the win over Kalkaska. (Photos by Boyne City Visual Imaging.)

Scholar-Athlete Awards Finalists Named

By Geoff Kimmerly
MHSAA.com senior editor

January 25, 2012

The 120 finalists for the Michigan High School Athletic Association's Scholar-Athlete Award for the 2011-12 school year -- including three each from three schools -- have been announced.

The program, which has been recognizing student-athletes since the 1989-90 school year, will honor 32 individuals from MHSAA member schools who participate in at least one sport in which the Association sponsors a postseason tournament. Farm Bureau Insurance underwrites the Scholar-Athlete Award, and will present a $1,000 scholarship to each recipient. Since the beginning of the program, 544 scholarships have been awarded.

Scholarships will be presented proportionately by school classification, with 12 scholarships to be awarded to Class A student-athletes, six female and six male; eight scholarships will be awarded to Class B student-athletes, four female and four male; six scholarships will be awarded to Class C student-athletes, three female and three male; and four scholarships will be awarded to Class D student-athletes, two female and two male. In addition, there also will be two at-large honorees which also are part of the general judging process, may come from any classification, and are designated by their school at the time of entry.

Every MHSAA member high school could submit as many applications as there are scholarships available in its classification, and could have more than one finalist. Marlette, Northville and Rochester Adams each have three finalists this year, while 20 schools have two: Bay City Central, Bloomfield Hills Brother Rice, Birmingham Groves, Dearborn, Delton Kellogg, East Lansing, Frankfort, Hillsdale Academy, Hopkins, Jenison, Kinde-North Huron, Midland, Midland Dow, Pontiac Notre Dame Prep, Rochester, Spring Lake, Springport, Tecumseh, White Lake Lakeland and Williamston.

Multiple-sport participation remains the norm among applicants. The average sport participation rate of the finalists is 2.58, while the average of the application pool was 2.13 – both within a tenth of last year’s rates in those categories. There are 66 three-plus sport participants in the finalist field, and all but three of the 28 sports in which the MHSAA sponsors postseason tournaments are represented.

Of 386 schools which submitted applicants, 51 submitted the maximum allowed. This year, 1,636 applications were received. All will be presented with certificates commemorating their achievement.  Additional Scholar-Athlete information, including a complete list of scholarship nominees, can be found on this MHSAA Website link.

The applications were judged by a 62-member committee of school coaches, counselors, faculty members, administrators and board members from MHSAA member schools. Selection of the 32 scholarship recipients will take place in early February. Class C and D scholarship recipients will be announced on February 7; Class B scholarship recipients will be announced on February 14, and Class A scholarship recipients will be announced on February 21. All announcements will be made on the MHSAA Web site.

To honor the 32 Scholar-Athlete Award recipients, a ceremony will take place during halftime of the Class C Boys Basketball Final, March 24 at the Breslin Student Events Center in East Lansing.

To be eligible for the award, students must have a cumulative grade point average of 3.50 (on a 4.0 scale), and previously have won a varsity letter in at least one sport in which the MHSAA sponsors a postseason tournament. Students also were asked to respond to a series of short essay questions, submit two letters of recommendation and submit a 500-word essay on the importance of sportsmanship in educational athletics.

Farm Bureau Insurance, one of Michigan's major insurers, has a statewide force of more than 400 agents serving more than 380,000 Michigan policyholders. Besides providing life, home, auto, farm, business and retirement insurance, the company also sponsors life-saving, real-time Doppler weather tracking systems in several Michigan communities.              

The MHSAA is a private, not-for-profit corporation of voluntary membership by more than 1,600 public and private senior high schools and junior high/middle schools which exists to develop common rules for athletic eligibility and competition. No government funds or tax dollars support the MHSAA, which was the first such association nationally to not accept membership dues or tournament entry fees from schools.  Member schools which enforce these rules are permitted to participate in MHSAA tournaments, which attract approximately 1.6 million spectators each year.


2011-12 Scholar-Athlete Award Finalists

BOYS CLASS A

Matthew Alexander Beem, Traverse City West

Brendon Clover, White Lake Lakeland

Ryan Denison, Dearborn

Saeed El Saghir, Bay City Central

Steven Alexander Fox, Grand Rapids Forest Hills Central

Christopher Robert Hagan, East Lansing

Alexander Hassan, Ann Arbor Huron

Joshua M. Heinze, Plymouth

Knute Hoffman, Midland

Hunter Holtrop, Okemos

Josh Hoogendoorn, Jenison

Nick Iacobellis, DeWitt

Jeremy Kozler, Livonia Stevenson

Conrad Arthur Lather, Midland Dow

Alec Latta, Northville

Gabriel Martinez, Livonia Franklin

Robert Paul, Bay City Central

Andrew Poterala, Northville

Nick Rao, Bloomfield Hills Brother Rice

Christopher Sesi, Bloomfield Hills Brother Rice

Blaine Stannard, Birmingham Groves

Alex Taylor, Rochester Adams

Daniel Tzou, Midland Dow

Garret Zuk, White Lake Lakeland

 

GIRLS CLASS A

Kelsey Adamski, Richland Gull Lake

Ellery Alexander, Caledonia

Kortnie L. Bush, Southgate Anderson

Jaymie Dyer, Hartland

Bethany Easom, Saline

Yara Nidal Fakhoury, Dearborn

Heather Smith, Farmington Hills Mercy

Amanda Marie Fodera, Fraser

Alexa Giovanatti, Rochester Adams

Morgan Hawver, Grand Haven

Hannah Marie Howarth, Gibraltar Carlson

Kelsey Kerin, St Clair

Hannah Lee, Rochester Adams

Maria Lepore, Rochester

Kelly Lunghamer, Birmingham Marian

Nicole McDermott, Mason

Gina Marie McNamara, Northville

Katelyn Alexandra Pekala, Midland

Abigail Rawling, Rochester

Dana Schrauben, Lake Orion

Alexis Stanton, Jenison

Alexandra Trecha, East Lansing

Jessica Turner, Birmingham Groves

Abigail Wilson, Trenton

 

BOYS CLASS B

Jordan S. Daley, Grand Rapids Christian

Griffin Dean, Grayling

Nathaniel P. Gaynor, Pontiac Notre Dame Prep

Mason E. Geno, Essexville Garber

Jeffrey John Gregory, Kingsford

Nathaniel Ferris Iveson, Middleville Thornapple Kellogg

Andrew Kelley, Allegan

Nathan Kossey, Tecumseh

Joseph Longstreet, Hastings

Dan Macalka, Comstock Park

Dillon McCarthy, Whitehall

Jacob Mineau, Marysville

Nick Huston Parnell, Spring Lake

Caleb Pung, Portland

Craig Zebell, Dowagiac

Alan Zhen, Livonia Clarenceville

 

GIRLS CLASS B

Sara Marie Barron, Pontiac Notre Dame Prep

Kathryn MacDermid Bollman, Williamston

Julie Buursma, Holland Christian

Kristin Gilbert, Hopkins

Hannah Grischke, Williamston

Sarah Hartley, Birch Run

Emily Kendro, Spring Lake

Nathalie Kenny, Manistee

Keara Kilbane, Hopkins

Laurin Masnari, Three Rivers

Erin Moser, Midland Bullock Creek

Rachel Neumann, Flint Powers Catholic

Brianne Nowak-Scott, Tecumseh

Emily Oren, Hamilton

Miranda Scott, Charlotte

Kaitlyn Stevens, Ovid-Elsie

 

BOYS CLASS C

Zachary French, Ishpeming Westwood

Dakota M. Hard, Quincy

Jonathan Andrew Harper, Clare

Ryan Hook, Delton Kellogg

Kolby Lange, Marlette

Trevor Lewis, Elkton-Pigeon-Bay Port Laker

Gregory Long, Sand Creek

Sean McBrayer, Unionville-Sebewaing

David Powers, Jr., Michigan Center

Benjamin Rebertus, Negaunee

Dirk E. Stoneman, Breckenridge

Ryan Watson, Delton Kellogg

 

GIRLS CLASS C

Brandy Bowers, Springport

Cayla Broton, Hesperia

Emily Crick, East Jordan

Lauren Dietrich, Gobles

Megan Kangas, Norway

Rachel Leightner, Springport

Lena Madison, New Buffalo

Rachel McEwen, Marlette

Karley Sauder, Marlette

Elyse Ann Louise Starck, Morley-Stanwood

Kelcey Stauffer, Sandusky

Isabella Yzerman, Bloomfield Hills Academy of the Sacred Heart

 

BOYS CLASS D

Evan Chalker, Buckley

Evan Dhyse, Kinde-North Huron

Seth Kintigh, Jackson Christian

Timothy Logghe, Peck

Joseph Nugent, Frankfort

Adam Plumstead, Frankfort

Sabeek Pradhan, Hillsdale Academy

Benjamin Ross, Lawrence

 

GIRLS CLASS D

Haley Buckey, Caseville

Kelsey Butcher, Morrice

Quinnlin Daily, Kingston

Natalija Galens, Watervliet Grace Christian

Haley Moore, Kinde-North Huron

Margaret Aileen Ryan, Hillsdale Academy

Jamie Lyn Seppanen, Eben Junction Superior Central

Alexandria Whitman, Fulton