Marquette Peaks in D1 Final

February 26, 2013

By John Raffel
Special to Second Half

BOYNE FALLS – Marquette is back as MHSAA Division I Boys Skiing champions after the Upper Peninsula school ended competition Monday with a combined score of 57 points to finish ahead of defending champion Clarkston’s 74 at Boyne Mountain.

The championship was the Redmen’s first since 2009 and eighth since skiing became an MHSAA-sponsored sport in 1975.

Marquette had a score of 34 in the slalom to match 2012 champion Clarkston. But Marquette was superior with a 23 in the giant slalom compared to 40 for Clarkston.

“I was proud of the boys,” said Marquette coach Marty Paulsen, who finished his third season running the program. “We scored well as a team. They all skied as a team and all knew what had to be done.

“It marks a pretty long tradition of skiing excellence and top skiing performances in the state,” he added. “It's great to be a part of that tradition.”

Taylor Janssen of White Lake Lakeland was the giant slalom individual champ while Finley Clark of Traverse City West took first place in the slalom.

Traverse City Central was third among teams at 95 points, Traverse City West fourth at 127 and Lake Orion fifth at 143. Okemos took sixth at 237 followed by South Lyon at 240, Grand Blanc at 271 and Brighton at 279.

Monday’s meet was Marquette’s finest performance this season, Paulsen said.  

Luke Johnson, Nick Weber and Matt Anderson paced the Marquette attack in the giant slalom by placing fourth, fifth and sixth, respectively. Dylan Larson scored a 14th place for Marquette. In the slalom, Nick Weber was eighth, Joe Weber 10th, Johnson 13th, Larson 15th, Anderson 23rd and Kyle King 36th.

 “We had good results in giant slalom at Regionals,” Paulsen said. “All three top teams – Traverse City West, Traverse City Central and Marquette struggled in slalom a little bit. At Regionals, Traverse City West pulled it out. They had a great slalom performance. So today, we were able to put together our giant slalom with our slalom.”

Lakeland’s Janssen was the giant slalom individual champ with runs of 29.77 and 30.39 for a combined championship time of 1:00.16. Derek VanItallie of Clarkston was second at 1:00.49.

Also in the GS, Loan Stetsko of Lakeland was third at 1:00.50 while Johnson, Weber and Anderson had combined times of 1:00.55, 1:00.60 and 1:00.61, respectively.

Seth Thompson of Fenton/Linden was seventh at 1:00.63, Robbie Cort of Birmingham Brother Rice eighth at 1:00.71, Clark, the slalom champ, finished ninth at 1:00.80, and Ryan Callahan of Clarkston 10th at 1:00.88.

Janssen's family has a place in the area and he considers Boyne as his home hill.

“I grew up on this hill so it's kind of nice to win it my senior year,” he said. “I was really happy with my results. It's my senior year and I'm trying to get it done. The results speak for themselves. I had a really good day and I was happy.”

Fifth in the slalom was Janssen's previous best finish at an MHSAA Final.

“I knew I was going to ski well today,” he added. “I took kind of a conservative first run and had not my best run. I kind of got angry after my first run and was in seventh. I went into my second run saying 'it's do or die here. I went in with complete confidence that whatever I do on this run will be my high school legacy. I went after it and it all worked out.”

Clark, a senior at Traverse City West, took first in the slalom with runs of 31.44 and 32.85 for a 1:04.29. John Merchant of Walled Lake Northern was second at 31.65 and 32.67 for 1:04.32, and Ryan Callahan of Clarkston was third in 32.28 and 32.96 for 1:05.34.

“Last year, I was going in and one of my skis popped off, and I was sitting second after the first round, Clark said. “I changed bindings in skis, and I matured a little more so I knew what I was doing a little bit more.”

Also in the slalom, Janssen, the GS champ, was fourth in 1:06.05, followed by Cort at 1:06.58,  VanItallie at 1:06.81, Kalvis Hornburg of TC Central at 1:07.49,  Nick Weber at 1:07.59, Alex McIntosh at 1:07.79 and Joe Weber at 1:07.86.

Click for full results. 

PHOTOS: (Top) Marquette celebrates its eighth MHSAA team championship. (Middle) Traverse City Central's Kurt Frick races down the mountain during Monday's competition. (Click to see more at HighSchoolSportsScene.com.)

MHSAA Winter Sports Start with Extended Basketball Schedules, New Wrestling Weights

By Geoff Kimmerly
MHSAA.com senior editor

December 13, 2022

The addition of two games to basketball regular-season schedules and a new series of wrestling weight classes are likely the most noticeable Winter 2022-23 changes as an estimated 65,000 athletes statewide take part in 13 sports for which the Michigan High School Athletic Association sponsors postseason tournaments.

Girls gymnastics and boys ice hockey teams were able to begin practice Oct. 31, with the rest of those sports beginning in November – including also girls and boys basketball, girls and boys bowling, girls competitive cheer, girls and boys skiing, Upper Peninsula girls and boys and Lower Peninsula boys swimming & diving, and girls and boys wrestling.

A variety of changes are in effect for winter sports this season, including a several that will be noteworthy and noticeable to teams and spectators alike.

Basketball remains the most-participated winter sport for MHSAA member schools with 33,000 athletes taking part last season, and for the first time, basketball teams may play up to 22 regular-season games. This increase from the previous 20-game schedule allows more games for teams at every high school level – varsity, junior varsity and freshman.

Another significant change has been made in wrestling, as the majority of boys wrestling weight classes have been adjusted for this season in anticipation of a national change coming in 2023-24. The updated boys weight classes are 106, 113, 120, 126, 132, 138, 144, 150, 157, 165, 175, 190, 215 and 285 pounds. Only 215 and 285 remain from the previous lineup. There is also one change to girls weight classes, with the 255 class replaced by 235 to also align with national high school standards.

A series of notable changes will affect how competition takes place at the MHSAA Tournament levels. In hockey, in addition to a new classification process that spread cooperative and single-school programs evenly throughout the three playoff divisions, the MHSAA Tournament will employ two changes. The Michigan Power Ratings (MPR) will be used to seed the entire Regional round, not just the top two teams, and prior to the start of Semifinals, a seeding committee will reseed the remaining four teams in each division with the top seed in each then facing the No. 4 seed, and the No. 2 seed facing No. 3.

Bowling also will see an MHSAA Tournament change, as the Team Regional format will mirror the long-standing Team Final with teams playing eight Baker games and two regular games at both levels.  And as also applied during the fall girls season, there is a new qualification process for divers seeking to advance to Lower Peninsula Boys Swimming & Diving Finals. In each of the three divisions, each Regional will be guaranteed 10 qualifiers for the Finals, with six more “floating” qualifier entries to be distributed to the Regionals that have one of the previous year’s top six returning Finals divers in their fields. If a team changes division from the previous season, any floating top-six spots are added to the six already allowed in the school’s new division.

A gymnastics rules change provides an opportunity for additional scoring during the floor exercise. A dance passage requirement was added in place of the former dance series requirement to encourage creativity and a more artistic use of dance. The dance passage requires gymnasts to include two Group 1 elements – one a leap with legs in cross or side split position, the other a superior element.

In competitive cheer, the penalty for going over the time limit in each round was adjusted to one penalty point for every second over the time limit, not to exceed 15 points. The new time limit rule is more lenient than the past penalty, which subtracted points based on ranges of time over the limit.

The 2022-23 Winter campaign culminates with postseason tournaments, as the championship schedule begins with the Upper Peninsula Girls & Boys Swimming & Diving Finals on Feb. 18 and wraps up with the Boys Basketball Finals on March 25. Here is a complete list of winter tournament dates:

Boys Basketball
Districts – March 6, 8, 10
Regionals – March 13, 15
Quarterfinals – March 21
Semifinals – March 23-24
Finals – March 25

Girls Basketball
Districts – Feb. 27, March 1, 3
Regionals – March 7, 9
Quarterfinals – March 14
Semifinals – March 16-17
Finals – March 18

Bowling
Regionals – Feb. 24-25
Finals – March 3-4

Competitive Cheer
District – Feb. 17-18
Regionals – Feb. 25
Finals – March 2-3

Gymnastics
Regionals – March 4
Finals – March 10-11

Ice Hockey
Regionals – Feb. 20-March 1
Quarterfinals – March 4
Semifinals – March 9-10
Finals – March 11

Skiing
Regionals – Feb. 13-17
Finals – Feb. 27

Swimming & Diving
Upper Peninsula Girls/Boys Finals – Feb. 18
Lower Peninsula Boys Diving Regionals – March 2
Lower Peninsula Boys Finals – March 10-11

Wrestling – Team
Districts – Feb. 8-9
Regionals – Feb. 15
Finals – Feb. 24-25

Wrestling – Individual
Districts – Feb. 11
Regionals – Feb. 18
Finals – March 3-4

The MHSAA is a private, not-for-profit corporation of voluntary membership by more than 1,500 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 more than 1.3 million spectators each year.