Macomb Bowling Over with Champions
By
Tom Markowski
Special for Second Half
February 11, 2021
Bowling coaches in Macomb County point to a number of factors to explain why high school programs in their county have been and remain so highly competitive.
One is tradition – and another is the automotive industry.
Greg Villasurda is in his sixth season coaching the girls program at St. Clair Shores Lake Shore, and he’s worked for Chrysler Corporation for the past 25 years. A graduate of Clinton Township Clintondale, Villasurda has been a bowler since his youth – and he said where he grew up, there were bowling establishments seemingly on every corner.
“I could walk to my bowling alley,” he said. “There were so many good bowlers back then. When I grew up, we didn’t have competitive bowling. We bowled for recreation. Back then all the dads worked for the Big 3, and they all bowled. That’s what you did.”
The numbers tell the tale of how that bowling way of life has cultivated success at the local high school level.
It should be noted that teams in other areas, like Genesee, Oakland and Wayne counties, also have excelled in high school bowling over the last 15 seasons. But since 2005, teams from Macomb County have won nine MHSAA Division 1 Finals titles (five boys, four girls) and finished second seven times (four for the boys, three for the girls).
Bowling is a sport the entire family can enjoy together and, in an odd way, this is how Villasurda became involved with coaching. His daughter Taylor was a freshman at Lake Shore in 2013 when she tried out for volleyball but was cut.
“She was really upset she didn’t make (the volleyball team),” Villasurda said. “She came home and said one of her friends was on the bowling team and (that) she wanted to bowl. I said, ‘What?’ She said yes and I said, well, let’s go. I bought her a ball, but it was just two weeks before tryouts. So we bowled every day to get her ready. She goes to try out and bowls a 216 and beat everybody. That opened up the floodgates.”
Taylor graduated from Lake Shore in 2017 and attends Siena Heights, where she competes on the bowling team.
Last season, Villasurda had one of the state’s top bowlers and a title-contending team. Led by then-junior Dani Decruydt – the 2019 Division 1 singles runner-up – Lake Shore qualified for the Division 1 Team Final by placing third at its Regional, and the Shorians finished a respectable eighth at the championship tournament. Lake Shore was also co-champ (with Macomb Dakota) in the Macomb Area Conference Red. Lake Shore, the smallest school by enrollment in the Red, had won the division title outright in 2019 and was second in 2018, Decruydt’s freshman year.
Lake Shore is a good example of the overall strength of the programs Macomb County. A member of the MAC Gold in 2016, Lake Shore moved to the Red where perennially strong programs like Dakota and L’Anse Creuse North compete. The Shorians took their lumps that first season within the division, but has competed well since. With all but one starter returning this season, Lake Shore is expected to be in the mix again.
Utica Eisenhower’s boys won their program’s first MHSAA Finals championship last season, as the Eagles came from behind in the final few frames to defeat Salem by five pins in the Division 1 championship match.
Eisenhower was a member of the MAC White last season and entered the MHSAA tournament ranked No. 1. Coach John Snider is in his seventh season this winter, and his experienced team is competing now in the MAC Red.
“The competition is extremely strong in the county,” Snider said. “The people I worked with in the MAC, the guys are so dedicated, so knowledgeable about the sport. They are good, solid, caring people. There are a lot of people committed to making this sport a success.”
Eisenhower’s top bowler is Carter Milasinovich, one of five juniors returning. Milasinovich averaged in the mid-220s the past two seasons and is backed by fellow juniors Nolan Horne and Jacob Matheson, whose mother Lisa Matheson coaches the girls varsity team.
The bowling community is a tightly-knit group. Proprietors, according to Snider, have bent over backward in their attempts to serve the public at large and the students competing in the sport. Snider said practices have been all but eliminated because of COVID-19 restrictions on the hours bowling centers can be open and how many people proprietors can accommodate.
“I’m real proud of the organization and the people behind us,” Snider said. “It’s a labor of love for all of us.”
Snider has bowled nearly his entire life and, like many, got his start through his parents who also bowled. One reason he got into coaching was the opportunity he had to coach his son during his senior year.
Eisenhower had its share of success before last season, as the Eagles had won the MAC White three of the last four seasons. But 2020 was magical. Eisenhower won six tournaments before going to the Finals. The Eagles trailed Salem until the final frame before pulling out the title-clinching victory.
“We were down like 70 to 80 pins in the seventh,” Snider said. “We talked all year about being gentlemen and not giving up, and I was thinking about the speech I was going to give them after we lost. I’m glad I didn’t have to give it.”
Eisenhower opened this season Jan. 30 with a strong victory (18-12) over Sterling Heights Stevenson. Those two teams plus Dakota are expected to challenge for the division title.
Last season Dakota, the MHSAA Division 1 champion in 2011 and ’12, and L’Anse Creuse North – the Division 1 runner-up in 2016 – tied for the Red title just as they did in 2018. Dakota captured the division title outright in 2019.
Dakota was a Regional champion last season and the top seed going into the Finals Round of 16, but was defeated by Davison in the first match.
“It happens,” Dakota coach Jason Kavanagh said of the loss to Davison. “We had a great year. Heck, we had a Baker game of 300, and I’ve only seen that one other time in my five years of coaching.”
Dakota always seems to be in the mix when it comes to deciding the Division 1 champion, and with five seniors returning, including Gregory Guzik, this season should be no different. The school will sponsor three junior varsity teams, one more than last year.
“There’s a level we try to keep (at Dakota),” Kavanagh said. “We don’t want to be arrogant. We don’t need that. We want to be confident. We want to be the best team out on those lanes.”
Kavanagh points to the tradition at the school and in the community, as well as the sport being passed on from generation to generation as keys to bowling being so popular and thus, competitive, in the county.
“A lot of it has to do with their parents who are good bowlers,” he said. “And they’re having the kids come here and compete carrying on what they’ve done.
“Plus being in the MAC Red, the competition is so tough. The better the competition, the better you bowl.”
This bowling fever is not limited to the Red or the White divisions, nor is it just in the northern part of the county. Craig Geml is in his eighth season at Warren Woods Tower, a member of the MAC Gold. The last seven he’s coached both the boys and girls programs. Noah Tafanelli, a senior this season, won the MHSAA Division 2 individual title last season. Tafanelli’s sister, Kayla, was a freshman last season and advanced to the Division 2 singles semifinals.
Geml contends that much of the success programs like his and many in the county have achieved got its start on Detroit’s eastside. Geml grew up in the 7 Mile Road and Kelly Road area in Detroit, and attended Harper Woods Notre Dame, a school that bordered Detroit’s city limits. Geml won a number of amateur bowling tournaments before competing in the sport while attending Wayne State University.
“Bowling was a working-man’s game, a middle class sport, back then,” Geml said. “It’s what you did. I bowled at two different lanes back then in Detroit, and that’s what your friends did. It’s a family-oriented sport. It’s almost hereditary. It’s grown into your physique.”
As time progressed and families moved further north into Macomb County, they took the sport with them and introduced it to their children.
Geml’s teams have won eight MAC Gold titles (boys and girls combined) and he’s proud of the success they’ve earned. Both squads have four starters returning this winter. And although neither team reached the MHSAA Finals a year ago, Geml did have six of his bowlers (out of 10) qualify as individuals.
Tom Markowski is a correspondent for the State Champs! Sports Network and previously directed its web coverage. He also covered primarily high school sports for the The Detroit News from 1984-2014, focusing on the Detroit area and contributing to statewide coverage of football and basketball. Contact him at [email protected] with story ideas for Oakland, Macomb and Wayne counties.
PHOTOS: (Top) Utica Eisenhower's Jacob Matheson follows through on a roll for the reigning Division 1 champion. (Middle) St. Clair Shores Lake Shore's Dani Decruydt was the Division 1 singles runner-up in 2019. (Photos courtesy of the Eisenhower and Lake Shore bowling programs, respectively.)
Preview: Powers Set to Strike Again
March 2, 2017
By Geoff Kimmerly
Second Half editor
This could be a weekend of unprecedented successes for Michigan high school bowlers.
The Davison and Flint Kearsley girls teams both will roll in Friday's Team Finals for their fifth championships over the last six seasons. Four 2016 singles champions also return, with St. Charles' Kyle Tuttle looking to add to his already record title streak by becoming the first and only four-time MHSAA champ.
This season's Finals will be bowled at the following centers: Division 1 at Sterling Heights’ Sterling Lanes, Division 2 at Canton’s Super Bowl, Division 3 at Battle Creek's M-66 Bowl and Division 4 at Lansing’s Royal Scot. Click for the full list of qualifiers, and come back to Second Half all weekend for coverage from all four Finals sites. Team Finals are Friday and Singles Finals are Saturday; both will begin at 8:30 a.m.
Division 1 Girls
Team: Top-ranked Davison has won four of the last five Division 1 championships and finished runner-up in 2015. The Cardinals won their Regional with 3,857 pins, the second highest count in any division, and a number of other expected contenders joined them – No. 2 Brownstown Woodhaven, No. 4 Macomb Dakota and No. 8 Saginaw Heritage also were among Regional champs, and unranked Caledonia claimed its Regional title with a score better than two of the ranked winners.
Singles: Davison senior Taylor Davis can close one of the most accomplished careers in MHSAA history after winning the singles title last season and making the Semifinals as a sophomore. She won her Regional by nearly 200 pins with a score of 1,417. The only other Division 1 competitor to approach her score was Caledonia senior Brittney Schnicke (1,390), another of the top bowlers in the state the last few seasons and Davis’ Quarterfinal opponent in 2016. St. Clair Shores Lakeview sophomore Stephanie Schalk also made the Semifinals last season.
Boys Division 1
Team: Nine teams cleared 4,000 pins at their Division 1 Regionals, including reigning Division 1 champion and top-ranked Wyandotte Roosevelt – which rolled 4,100 to win last week. The division-high score came from unranked Flushing (with 4,301), which didn’t even qualify for the Finals a year ago. Hudsonville will return to the Finals after rolling the second-highest Regional score, 4,229; other Regional champs were No. 2 Belleville (4,101) and unranked Clarkston (4,059) and St. Clair Shores Lakeview (3,911).
Singles: Both finalists from last season are back and returning through the same Regional; 2016 runner-up Gabe Cassise, a Roosevelt junior, won that Regional with a 1,291, while reigning champion and senior Brad Demarle from Warren Mott qualified with a ninth-place 1,165. Four of the six Division 1 bowlers who cleared 1,300 pins during Regionals did so at Grand Haven’s Starlite Lanes, led by Buccaneers’ senior Jimmy Mitchell at 1,395 – he also was one of only five non-seniors to make the Finals’ Round of 16 last season. Davison junior Brandon Kreiner was another of those five, and he won his Regional last week with 1,325 pins. Westland John Glenn junior Matt Essa (1,308) also cleared 1,300 in winning a Regional title.
Division 2 Girls
Team: Top-ranked Flint Kearsley also has won four of the last five championships in this division and three straight. Its 3,910 Regional score was nearly 850 pins better than that field and the tops of all girls teams in any division. Total, eight of the top 10 ranked teams qualified for Friday’s Finals, with No. 8 Charlotte posting the second-highest Regional score in the division of 3,790.
Singles: Last season’s runner-up, now-junior Sydney Urben of Wayland, and 2016 semifinalist Madchen Breen of Warren Regina, now a senior, both are back this weekend after finishing runners-up in their respective Regionals. Jackson senior Kaylee Collier finished ahead of Urben with the highest Regional score in the division, 1,282, and Taylor Truman senior Miranda Norris was right behind winning her Regional with a 1,280. Charlotte senior Brooke Noecker and Jackson senior Jamie Bleiler both made the Quarterfinals last season as well.
Boys Division 2
Team: Reigning champion Lansing Eastern stunned the field last season – but the Regional results this season make it looks less likely for another unranked team to pull off the same surprise. Top-ranked New Boston Huron rolled the highest Regional score in any division, 4,371, and No. 3 Flint Kearsley (4,091) and No. 4 Coldwater (4,191) also won Regional titles with 4,000-plus pins. Kearsley won Division 2 in 2014 and 2015 before finishing runner-up last season to the Quakers, who didn’t qualify for this weekend.
Singles: Like in Division 1, the reigning singles champion will be back for more – Sturgis senior Austin Robison qualified second at his Regional with a score of 1,304. Marquette senior teammates Liam Robinson (1,297) and Hunter Negri (1,191) both made the Round of 16 last season and qualified first and third, respectively, at their Regional last weekend, and Kearsley senior Bryce McKerchie made the Quarterfinals last season and won his Regional last week by 260 pins with the highest score in Division 2 of 1,488. Warren Lincoln senior Tyler Kolassa made the Round of 16 in Division 3 last year after winning the title in 2015.
Division 3 Girls
Team: Division 3 has celebrated nine different champions over the last nine seasons, and this tournament could be wide open as well. Only one of the top five (No. 2 Battle Creek Pennfield) and four of the top-10 ranked teams advanced to this weekend. Unranked Gladwin posted the top Regional score in Division 3, 3,481, followed closely by No. 7 Birch Run at 3,477. Pennfield did win its Regional as well. Last season’s Division 4 champion, Ithaca, also is in Division 3 and qualified.
Singles: Gladwin senior Kasidey Easlick was the only non-senior to make last season’s Semifinals, and she qualified again placing ninth at her Regional. Grand Rapids West Catholic senior Katelyn LaBelle also made the Quarterfinals last season and won her Regional last weekend. Three other Regional champs broke 1,200 pins – Marine City’s Alyssa Crampton, Adrian Madison’s Alexis Cable and Gladwin’s Carley VanTiem.
Boys Division 3
Team: Saginaw Swan Valley is the reigning champion and entered the postseason ranked No. 1, but just qualified with a third-place at its Regional. Seventh-ranked Battle Creek Pennfield – last season’s runner-up – is no doubt ready to step in and claim its first MHSAA team title, and rolled a division-best 4,045 to win its Regional. Four of the six Regional champions were not ranked – creating some intriguing possibilities for an under-the-radar team to step in as the division’s sixth different champion this decade.
Singles: Only one of last season’s semifinalists was a senior, but only one of the other three qualified to compete this weekend – reigning runner-up Grant Baker, a Jonesville junior, who qualified ninth at his Regional. Three others from last season’s Round of 16 also will be back; Battle Creek Pennfield sophomore James Ruoff (1,288) and Dundee senior Quinn Auten (1,348) both won their Regionals, and Wyoming Kelloggsville senior Gage Nickerson was fourth at his behind teammate and champion Zach Postma (1,227). Richmond junior C.J. Wagner is one to watch as well; he won his Regional by 138 pins with an incredible 1,453. And Adrian Madison junior Isaac Solis (1,256) made the Division 4 Semifinals last season.
Girls Division 4
Team: Jackson Vandercook Lake is ranked No. 1 and won Division 4 titles in 2011, 2013 and 2014. The Jayhawks won their Regional with a pinfall of 3,239, second in the division behind only unranked Traverse City Christian (3,248). Second-ranked St. Louis also was a Regional champ as the top five ranked teams all qualified for this weekend.
Singles: This could be anyone’s competition, with Flint Beecher/Mount Morris senior Shaierica Gould and Unionville-Sebewaing junior Tiffany Lutz the only qualifiers from last season’s Round of 16 back; both were Regional runners-up last weekend. Vandercook Lake sophomore Mackenzie Johnson rolled the high score for Division 4 Regionals at 1,086, followed by Rogers City junior Stephanie Marx at 1,077.
Boys Division 4
Team: All seven seasons with a Division 4 tournament have seen a new champion emerge – but that trend may come to an end this weekend. St. Charles, which won Division 4 in 2010, won its Regional last weekend with a score of 4,003, ahead of reigning Finals champion Sandusky (3,793). Those were two of the top three scores in the division last weekend, but there is hope for another new winner. Vandercook Lake, a frequent power and the Division 3 runner-up in 2009, posted the second-highest score in the division in winning its Regional with a 3,879.
Singles: After becoming the first to win three MHSAA individual titles last season, St. Charles senior Kyle Tuttle can become unprecedented one more time in his final high school competition. He won his Regional rolling a 1,203, second-highest in the division only to Bronson sophomore Brandon Hyska (1,206), who made the Round of 16 last year. Genesee junior Luke Cantrell was Finals runner-up last season and won last week’s Regional with a 1,118. Vandercook Lake sophomore Korey Reichard and Sandusky senior Cody Johnston also made the 2016 Round of 16, and Whittemore-Prescott freshman Tyler Watkins is an intriguing prospect after winning his Regional with a 1,192.
PHOTO: Davison's girls bowling team celebrates last season's Division 1 championship. (Click to see more at HighSchoolSportsScene.com.)