Century of School Sports: MHSAA Blazes Trail Into Cyberspace
By
Geoff Kimmerly
MHSAA.com senior editor
January 9, 2025
When the MHSAA took its first footsteps into cyberspace in 1996 – and then officially launched MHSAA.com on Aug. 15, 1997 – the jump into the internet revolution was to help characterize the MHSAA’s focus on the future, according to a Muskegon Chronicle report quoting then-executive director Jack Roberts.
Predicting how that future would quickly and continuously unfold may have been anyone’s guess. But over the next nearly three decades, MHSAA.com has grown, evolved, added a companion website and then united them into a single valuable landing spot not just for those who work to make our games happen, but the millions who cheer for them as well.
The first rendition of an MHSAA website reached the World Wide Web during Fall 1996 with an American Online (aol.com) URL and included rankings for the MHSAA Football Playoffs. The official version 1.0 of MHSAA.com launched just about a year later, anchored by what would be the website’s priorities for the next 15 years – an area titled “Administration” containing tools primarily for school administrators, a “Services” section highlighting sportsmanship, scholarship and safety; and “The Games” that included sport-by-sport details on rules changes, tournament assignments and historical information.
The MHSAA reported more than 12,000 visitors to its online home during October 1997 – about 400 daily, with the weekly football rankings the largest draw. A little more than a year later, in November 1998, the MHSAA enjoyed its biggest month to date with more than 2,500 visitors daily to climb past 850,000 since the launch of the website. More than 58,000 of those views came during the release of that season’s Football Playoff pairings, and another major draw was the “Games Wanted” page listing teams looking for opponents, which was athletic directors’ biggest ask when surveyed two years earlier on what they wanted most from an MHSAA website.
MHSAA.com already was pushing far ahead of the curve, especially when it came to state school sports associations. But that start was only slightly a sign of things to come. The website has taken on a life that far surpasses any “much has changed, much has stayed the same” scenario.
Truth be told, the goals for the website have not changed in several years – MHSAA.com has provided a place for member school administrators and coaches, and game officials, to do their daily MHSAA-related business. But that mission has been joined by a growing emphasis on telling the story of school sports to the growing number of fans paying us a visit.
What’s changed is how the MHSAA has delivered on those missions.
The website’s design evolved during the final years of the 1990s and first decade of the 2000s, following the fast-moving progression across the internet. Navigation – getting users where they want to go easily – became the buzzword, and adding more and more information to the site meant adding better avenues to find and organize it.
The MHSAA redesign carried out during the 2009-10 school year – the first built by now-longtime partner Gravity Works Design & Development in Lansing – propelled the website in a big way toward what you see today. Navigation menus now remained a static part of every page as users navigated within the site. A large action photo was placed at the top of the front page to bring it to life, as were feeds from the MHSAA’s well-followed social media accounts and a video player highlighting the growing broadcast and video presence.
And then came the largest leap. In late 2011, the MHSAA became one of two state associations nationwide at the time (along with Arizona) to begin creating its own fan-focused editorial content. In January 2012, the MHSAA launched its Second Half website as a home for feature stories, blogs, videos and coverage of MHSAA Finals, produced mostly by longtime media members operating as correspondents from their various regions of the state.
For the 2008-09 school year, MHSAA.com had attracted 19.2 million page views. For 2013-14, the count (including both the main and Second Half sites) totaled 22.5 million. That jumped to 27.2 million for 2018-19. And the most defining design change was still ahead.
While the Second Half’s article content had begun to draw nearly 1 million page views annually – a success considering the state has about 170,000 high school athletes – that content remained separated from an already-robust amount of schedules, scores, results and records data the MHSAA had published on its main site over 25 years, plus all the other postseason promotion and information fans had begun to seek.
So in 2022, the MHSAA made one more big jump to land at the website you’re visiting today.
Paying special attention to not disrupt the work of school people using the site for administrative purposes, the MHSAA closed down Second Half and brought all that content to the front of MHSAA.com – for the first time making the front page of the main website fan-focused. That emphasis on spectator experience continued with new, easier-to-understand navigation, and redesigns of sports pages to better promote MHSAA Tournament events and Michigan Power Ratings (MPR), ticket ordering and record book information fans seek. All of the tools school sports people relied on in the past remain, just flip-flopped with the stories and stats that tell our story to a growing audience.
This new version also is geared differently to better serve an audience that has moved significantly toward viewing on phones. Roughly 70 percent of MHSAA.com page views are coming on mobile devices, and this latest design was built to be responsive and best-serve that visitor preference.
The response to the most recent redesign indeed tells the rest of the story – 38.2 million page views during 2023-24, a 40-percent jump from five years earlier. The largest-drawing single day of the school year was March 1, 2024, with nearly 444,000 views as that year’s Winter tournaments began their final month. Team schedule pages in 2023-24 drew 13 million views, with 2.1 million views of tournament brackets and 1.7 million of the statewide scores page. The site’s editorial content – all of those features, game stories and more – were up to 1.65 million views.
MHSAA.com remains what it’s always been, but now it’s so much more – and no doubt, the best is yet to come.
Previous "Century of School Sports" Spotlights
Dec. 31: State's Storytellers Share Winter Memories - Read
Dec. 17: MHSAA Over Time - Read
Dec. 10: On This Day, December 13, We Will Celebrate - Read
Dec. 3: MHSAA Work Guided by Representative Council - Read
Nov. 26: Finals Provide Future Pros Early Ford Field Glory - Read
Nov. 19: Connection at Heart of Coaches Advancement Program - Read
Nov. 12: Good Sports are Winners Then, Now & Always - Read
Nov. 5: MHSAA's Home Sweet Home - Read
Oct. 29: MHSAA Summits Draw Thousands to Promote Sportsmanship - Read
Oct. 23: Cross Country Finals Among MHSAA's Longest Running - Read
Oct. 15: State's Storytellers Share Fall Memories - Read
Oct. 8: Guided by 4 S's of Educational Athletics - Read
Oct. 1: Michigan Sends 10 to National Hall of Fame - Read
Sept. 25: MHSAA Record Books Filled with 1000s of Achievements - Read
Sept. 18: Why Does the MHSAA Have These Rules? - Read
Sept. 10: Special Medals, Patches to Commemorate Special Year - Read
Sept. 4: Fall to Finish with 50th Football Championships - Read
Aug. 28: Let the Celebration Begin - Read
PHOTOS (Top) Clockwise from top left are images of the front page of MHSAA.com from the years 1998, 2005, this week and 2014. (Middle) This is the front page of the MHSAA's Second Half site from June, 16, 2017.
Granlund's Voice Continues to Tell Story in 56th Year Serving Clarkston Schools
By
Keith Dunlap
Special for MHSAA.com
February 13, 2025
CLARKSTON — When many people think of Clarkston as a community, high school and athletic program, they understandably think of Dan Fife.
After all, Fife was a hometown hero as a standout basketball and baseball player at Clarkston High School, a college basketball player at Michigan, a professional baseball player and ultimately, the longtime boys basketball coach and athletic director who built that hoops program into a state power.
But what some might not know is that there is another prominent figure connected to the school and athletic program, one who has served the community since the year after Fife graduated from high school in 1967.
It’s hard to imagine anyone having Clarkston more in his heart and soul than Neil Granlund.
The 79-year-old Granlund has been a part of the Clarkston community since starting his teaching career in the district in 1968. He is best-known at the moment not just as an announcer within the athletic program, but as pretty much THE announcer for Clarkston athletics.
Granlund is the main announcer for contests in football, boys and girls basketball, hockey, boys and girls soccer, and track & field. He also helps out announcing for volleyball, wrestling, lacrosse and field hockey.
And those are just the high school sports within the community. Granlund also announces middle school track events.
Granlund took over the football and basketball duties in 2018 after the longtime “Voice of the Wolves,” Dale Ryan, retired. For all those years, Granlund was Ryan’s right-hand man spotting in the press box and working the clock.
When Ryan stepped away, it was a no-brainer to have Granlund take over, even if he was seemingly announcing every other sport for the school.
When Granlund stepped into Ryan’s role for football and basketball, he said Fife offered some advice.
“He gave me instructions on what to and how he wanted it done,” Granlund said. “He told me that you’re not the cheerleader. He didn’t want nicknames for the kids. Just keep it strait-laced and treat both schools fairly. I’ve always stuck to that.”
Granlund said announcing Clarkston football games when the Wolves played at Michigan Stadium in Ann Arbor and doing Clarkston team introductions when they advanced to championship games at Ford Field have been thrills, adding others in the community have helped make his life easier when switching from sport to sport.
“I had mediocre understanding of the sports, but I’ve had good people to work with,” he said. “In football, you are only as good as your spotter.”
Clarkston as an athletic program has had many memorable moments since 2013, whether it’s been the football team breaking through and winning Division 1 titles in 2013, 2014 and 2017, or Fife finally realizing a lifelong dream by leading the basketball team to Class A titles in 2017 and 2018.
But Granlund said the most memorable moment came during a basketball game at the old high school between Clarkston and historic archival Pontiac Northern.
Clarkston was coached by Fife, while Northern was coached by the legendary Sy Green, and the game was played before the 3-point line.
Granlund said before that game, referees told him that they couldn’t hear the buzzer on the scoreboard.
So they gave Granlund a task.
The referees gave Granlund a towel and said If the game came down to a buzzer-beating shot, Granlund would monitor the clock and the action on the court to see if the player beat the clock with his shot. Granlund would then throw the towel to the middle of the court to indicate that the shot counted.
“Sure thing, that’s what did happen,” said Granlund, adding Clarkston was down by two and attempting a game-tying shot. “Clarkston went on to tie the game. I remember when that did go off — I had that panel in front of me so I could see exactly what the time was on the clock when it had left the player’s hand — both Sy Green and Dan Fife looked at me and I gave the signal that the basket was good. That tied the game, and it went into overtime. That was exciting. Everything in that old gym was exciting.”
While that was the most memorable moment to date for Granlund at Clarkston, the one he wants to see most hasn’t happened yet.
Granlund’s biggest dream is to see the boys soccer team win a Finals championship, something it came closest to accomplishing in 2007 when the Wolves lost to East Kentwood in the Division 1 title match.
Granlund was the school’s first boys soccer coach, starting the program in 1983, and helped build it up until he stepped away as coach in 1990. But he has stayed involved as the announcer and a general supporter.
“I wish we could (win a state title) one of these days,” he said. “Having started the soccer program here, I always stuck with it.”
Even though he is nearing 80, Granlund might still be around to one day see the Wolves win that soccer championship. He still teaches a construction tech class for the high school, doing so for the same reason he still announces: He loves being around kids he says are so good to him.
Teaching also gives him an opportunity to spend more time with his grandson, who is in the class.
“He said ‘Grandpa, will you stick around for a couple more years?’” Granlund said. “I said, ‘Oh yeah.’”
As for announcing, listen for his voice to still be a fixture at Clarkston sporting events for the foreseeable future.
“For a while longer,” he said. “I really do enjoy it.”
Keith Dunlap has served in Detroit-area sports media for more than two decades, including as a sportswriter at the Oakland Press from 2001-16 primarily covering high school sports but also college and professional teams. His bylines also have appeared in USA Today, the Washington Post, the Detroit Free Press, the Houston Chronicle and the Boston Globe. He served as the administrator for the Oakland Activities Association’s website from 2017-2020. Contact him at [email protected] with story ideas for Oakland, Macomb and Wayne counties.
PHOTOS (Top) Neil Granlund, speaking into the microphone, announces during a Clarkston home basketball game. (Middle) Granlund, right, takes his place in the Michigan Stadium press box in advance of announcing Clarkston’s “Battle at the Big House” football game. (Below) Granlund narrates the action during another event at the school. (Photos by Larry Wright.)