Ford Arrives in 1st MHSAA Title Game
March 27, 2015
By Geoff Kimmerly
Second Half editor
EAST LANSING – Kenneth Flowers has been reminded more than a few times this week what he stepped into when he took over the Detroit Henry Ford boys basketball program eight seasons ago.
Congratulatory e-mails. Phone calls. Contacts from Henry Ford alumni dating back to the class of 1971.
“The community is huge over there,” Flowers said. “It’s amazing how basketball brings a community together like this.”
Imagine if he leads the Trojans to their first MHSAA championship Saturday.
They earned that opportunity, winning the first Semifinal in program history Friday, 64-38 over Cadillac at Michigan State University’s Breslin Center.
Prior to this season, Henry Ford had played in a Quarterfinal only once before, in 1984. But it will take on Wyoming Godwin Heights at 6:30 Saturday night to decide this season’s Class B champion.
“Our school, it’s the first time in history coming into the Breslin. And making this deep run, I just want to keep it going,” Ford senior guard Joshua Davis said. “Especially this being my last year, I’m very excited, very anxious, ready to make history.”
Flowers played his high school basketball at Detroit Redford and later led the junior varsity under coach Derrick McDowell – who has Detroit Western International playing for its first MHSAA championship as well, in the Class A Final.
Flowers took over for McDowell at Redford for the 2005-06 season and stayed until the school closed during the summer of 2007. Flowers started at Ford that fall.
The Trojans have posted winning records six of eight seasons under him – with the two sub-.500 records coming the last two seasons. But they rebounded this winter and finished second in the Detroit Public School League West Division 1 behind only Western.
Ford seemed to play with the jitters many first-time visitors to Breslin Center experience. It fell behind by five halfway through the first quarter to Cadillac, which played in a Semifinal for the third straight season.
But the Trojans (21-5) got the score back to even at 11-11 by the end of the quarter – and put the game nearly out of reach over the next eight minutes with a 23-6 run.
Junior point guard James Towns got comfortable quickly on the collegiate floor, making 9 of 12 shots and all six of his free-throw attempts for 24 points to go with four assists and three steals. Davis added 17 points and senior guard Antaun Carter added 10 and four steals.
Senior guard Andrew Emington led Cadillac with 14 points, and senior forward Ethan Myers had 13. To its credit, their team came back from a 5-6 start this winter and despite graduating its leading scorer from a year ago. The Vikings finished 18-9 and went a combined 58-21 over the three-season run.
“I told our guys in the locker room that were getting emotional, you can cry for the finality of the season, but don’t cry for the outcome of the game,” Cadillac coach Ryan Benzenberg said. “Because all we ever wanted, when this thing ended, was to lose to a team better than us. And I have no shame saying that Henry Ford is a better basketball team than we were tonight.”
Click for the full box score and video from the postgame press conference.
PHOTOS: (Top) Henry Ford players including freshman Da’Mon Gilmore (15) celebrate their first Semifinal win as they leave the floor Friday night. (Middle) Ford’s Joshua Davis finishes a dunk.
Ferndale Caps Winter Season with 1st Boys Hoops Title Since 1966
By
Dean Holzwarth
Special for MHSAA.com
March 25, 2023
EAST LANSING – One team was going to end a long championship drought in Saturday’s boys basketball Division 2 Final.
Ferndale’s was especially lengthy, and spanned more than five decades.
And now it is no longer.
The Eagles won their first Finals championship in 57 years with a 44-38 victory over Grand Rapids South Christian at Breslin Center.
Ferndale had last won a state title in 1966.
“The drought is over,” Eagles coach Juan Rickman said. “That’s big time, and the biggest part about making it down here was seeing how charged up the community was and the school was so charged up. It’s the greatest feeling to see how vested our community was in our success.”
Ferndale senior Christopher Williams led the way with 16 points and four rebounds.
“It feels great,” Williams said. “Especially since the past four years we’ve been to the same place and lost twice in a row to the same team, and now it feels like weight is lifted off my shoulders.
“We started off the season 1-5, and going till now we knew if we stayed together through adversity then we could do it. And it made it more impactful that it was our coach’s first state title, and that’s what we wanted to do.”
Added senior point guard Cameron Reed, who had a game-high seven assists: “It’s incredibly special. I wasn't born back then, my teammates weren’t born and my coaches weren’t born. It definitely rejuvenated the whole city and community.”
Ferndale led 8-4 at the end of the first quarter, and both teams shot poorly in the first half. The Eagles connected on a paltry 24 percent from the field, and South Christian on 35 percent of its attempts. Nate Brinks drained a 3-pointer at the buzzer to give the Sailors a 16-14 halftime lead.
Junior guard Jake Vermaas opened the third quarter with a 3-pointer to make it 19-14, but Ferndale made a charge.
The Eagles sliced the deficit to one (25-24) on a 3-pointer by Trenton Ruth, and Cameron Reed tied it at 28-28 with an acrobatic layup.
“Our team was mentally strong, and I’m so proud of them for their accomplishment,” Rickman said. “Just so committed to the process and just being resilient.”
An 8-2 spurt by Ferndale over the first three minutes of the fourth quarter made it 36-30.
“That was extremely important, and we always want to win the first four minutes,” Rickman said. “And we tried to open up the fourth quarter with what we call a kill; we want to get five straight stops and score on two or three of those possessions so we can build a lead. We did that fairly well against a good team.”
South Christian was attempting to win football and basketball Finals championships during the same school year, and was looking for its first basketball title since 2005.
“It was a really hard-fought game and I thought we played at our speed, but it got away from us a little bit,” first-year Sailors coach Taylor Johnson said.
“But it doesn’t take away from what we accomplished this year. We’ve been through it all, including three season-ending injuries, and to still make it to the state finals is an incredible feat.”
Senior Jacob DeHaan and Vermaas led the Sailors with 14 points apiece, while senior Sam Medendorp added seven points, seven rebounds and four blocked shots.
PHOTOS (Top) Ferndale raises the Division 2 championship trophy Saturday night at Breslin Center. (Middle) Christopher Williams (13) tries to power past South Christian’s Sam Weiss (23) to the rim. (Below) Cameron Reed (0) leads a break for the Eagles.