Longtime Coach Carman Earns 300th W
April 19, 2016
By Dick Hoekstra
Reprinted from Gratiot County Herald
Rollie Carman set a goal of reaching 300 wins when he started coaching varsity baseball at Blanchard Montabella in 1994.
He reached that goal 22 years later when his St. Louis team defeated Harrison 9-1 in its season opener April 12. The Sharks then blanked Harrison 14-0 in the second game of the doubleheader.
“My first goal I ever had as a coach I just accomplished today, and it’s pretty emotional,” Carman said after the sweep. “You go through all those memories of all those years. It’s been a tough go.”
Carman started coaching in 1989 with the Ithaca junior varsity team. After Montabella and four years with the Alma junior varsity, he came to St. Louis for one year, Carson City-Crystal for four, Ithaca for eight, and back to St. Louis for the last three.
“That’s my wife over there,” he said of Karen Carman. “We finally got here, and this is what I’ve been shooting for for a long, long time. “To be honest, I didn’t know if I was going to get there or not. You don’t know if you’re going to be alive tomorrow when you get older. Quite a few kids who I coached in the past showed up to watch it. So that was kind of a thrill too.
“It was definitely a high point.”
PHOTOS: (Top) Rollie Carman, then coach at Ithaca, talks with an umpire during a 2012 game. (Middle) Carman, now coach at St. Louis, holds up the cake presented after winning the 300th win of his career last week. (Top photo by HighSchoolSportsScene.com, bottom courtesy of St. Louis athletic department.)
Beal City Ace Closes Finals-Filled Career with Perfection in Repeat
By
Keith Dunlap
Special for MHSAA.com
June 15, 2024
EAST LANSING — Getting to pitch in a state championship game once is rare in itself. Doing so twice is even more improbable.
But three times during a career? Take a bow, Beal City senior Cayden Smith.
Two years ago, Smith pitched two innings of relief in a loss to Riverview Gabriel Richard. Last year, he allowed one run in a complete-game win over Plymouth Christian Academy.
Getting the ball again in a championship game Saturday, Smith saved the best for his last high school game and achieved something no pitcher had done before in a Final, throwing a perfect game in a 10-0 Beal City win over Norway that ended after five innings.
Smith, who will play for Central Michigan, struck out eight batters to earn his second-straight Finals win.
“Nerves are going to get to you every year,” Smith said. “It’s just who can overcome.”
Smith did more than that in a performance that reduced Beal City head coach Brad Antcliff to tears of joy after the game when describing it.
“That’s Cayden Smith,” Antcliff said. “The kid is a gamer. He wants the ball. He had all the command of his pitches today, and he pounded the zone. You have kids that have ‘it.’ I can’t tell you what ‘it’ is. But Cayden Smith has ‘it.’ He’s a bulldog.”
Beal City’s offense was also potent, starting when senior Jack Fussman singled home Smith for the first run in the bottom of the first inning.
Beal City (34-6) then grabbed a 2-0 lead in the second on an RBI single with two outs by junior Owen McKenny.
The Aggies kept the pressure on in the third, scoring four times to take a 6-0 lead. Senior Lane Gross hit a two-run double to the gap in right-center, and then Smith helped his own cause with a two-run double that made it 5-0 Beal City. A walk with the bases loaded gave the Aggies a 6-0 advantage.
In the sixth inning, Beal City took an 8-0 lead on a two-run single by Fussman, and then completed the game via the run-differential rule when a single up the middle by senior Josh Wilson ended up scoring two runs with a Norway throwing error to home.
Fussman finished with four RBI for Beal City, which won its sixth Finals title in school history.
Even in defeat, Norway produced a terrific story.
The Knights (28-4-1) were attempting to become the first team from the Upper Peninsula to win a Finals title in baseball, and getting to the championship game was no small feat, especially after beating a team from the Catholic High School League, Marine City Cardinal Mooney, in a Semifinal.
But Norway simply ran into a buzzsaw in Smith and a Beal City team that was ranked No. 1 in the state for a reason.
“We’re going to cherish it forever,” Norway head coach Tony Adams said. “It was a heck of an accomplishment. We made school history, we made history for the Upper Peninsula, and today’s result isn’t going to diminish that. You can’t take that away.”
PHOTOS (Top) Beal City’s Cayden Smith (26) makes his move toward the plate during his team’s Division 4 championship win. (Middle) The Aggies' Jack Fussman gets under a throw home to score. (Below) A Beal City hitter lines up a pitch.