Brother Rice Rides Momentum To Top of D1
March 8, 2014
By Geoff Mott
Special to Second Half
UNIVERSITY CENTER – Birmingham Brother Rice coach Mike Venos realized his boys swimming and diving team had the talent to win an MHSAA title after the Warriors finished runner-up to four-time champion Saline at last year’s Lower Peninsula Division 1 Finals.
“The way we ended last year gave us some big momentum,” Venos said. “You saw the look in their eyes. They were committed from that point into doing something special.”
Brother Rice cruised to its first LP Division 1 championship since 2007 on Saturday at Saginaw Valley State University’s Gerstacker Regional Aquatic Center, winning with 345 points. Livonia Stevenson finished runner-up with 202 while Holland West Ottawa finished third (191), Ann Arbor Pioneer fourth (185) and Bloomfield Hill fifth at 136 points.
Brother Rice won all three relays and took advantage of depth throughout its lineup to win the third championship in Venos’s 16th season as the Warriors coach. It’s the eighth boys swimming and diving title in Brother Rice history.
“We don’t shoot for state championships,” Venos said. “We shoot for our best times. We can only control what we can control.
“Every practice was a state meet. They beat each other up, and it showed how hard they’ve worked for this today.”
Joe Krause earned the lone individual title for the Warriors, winning the 50-yard freestyle in 20.63 seconds. He joined juniors Gust Kouvaris and Mark Blinstrub and sophomore Bobby Powrie in winning the 400 freestyle relay. The group broke the MHSAA all-Finals record with a 3:02.06 finish.
Krause also teamed with Powrie, senior Bradford Jones and junior Jack Kennedy in winning the 200 freestyle relay in 1:25.10, outkicking the Ann Arbor Pioneer relay team by a tenth of a second.
“We don’t go looking to win meets, just go out and swim our fastest to do the best that we can,” Krause said. “We had a fast week of practice, and we just wanted to swim to the best of our ability. We’ve shown the ability to excel all season.”
Krause credits the leadership he learned as a freshman in helping shape this Warriors team into a championship contender. Of the 33 swimmers and divers on the team, 16 are freshman.
“It’s been seven years since we’ve won a title, so this is pretty awesome,” Krause said. “When I was a freshman, those seniors had great leadership skills and they knew what it would take to get us back to the top, and that helped.
“I tried to emulate the peers before me. We had a challenge with so many freshmen, and they were ready for it.”
Kouvaris, Blinstrub, Jones and Drew Grady kicked off the Finals with a championship in the 200 medley relay, winning in 1:32.77.
Matching up relays was Venos’ greatest challenge.
“We have a very deep team and there can be a number of different options with the relay teams,” Venos said. “It made it pretty fun because we had all those options.
“A turning point this season came at the Oakland County Meet. We stepped up and I was really surprised at what we could do as a team. Once we got to this weekend, as coaches, we just got out of the way and let these guys have fun.”
Livonia Stevenson senior Nick Arakelian recorded an all-Finals record in the 200 individual medley, winning with a 1:47.47 to edge the previous record by nearly four-tenths of a second.
Arakelian went on to win the 500 freestyle with an LP Division 1 Final record time of 4:24.84. He also helped the Livonia Stevenson 200 medley relay and 400 freestyle relay teams to runner-up finishes.
“The records were definitely a goal that I kept in mind, but when I get here I got relaxed and had fun with my team,” Arakelian said. “I knew I had a shot, and I was a little jumpy during preliminaries. But I settled down.”
Arakelian, who will head to Queens University in Charlotte, N.C., next year to swim collegiately, was in seventh place after completing the butterfly portion in the first event of the 200 IM. He tied the leader after the backstroke and easily pulled away through the breaststroke and freestyle.
“You don’t see much of a crossover (for swimmers) in the 200 IM and 500 freestyle, so I’m pretty proud of myself,” Arakelian said. “I realized I needed to relax out there, and it worked.”
Holland West Ottawa junior Tabahn Afrik captured a pair of Finals titles that eluded him as a sophomore. After runner-up finishes in the 50 and 100 freestyle events last year, Afrik won the 100 with an LP Division 1 meet record 43.9-second finish. He also won the 200 freestyle in 1:38.18 and helped West Ottawa to third-place finishes in the 200 and 400 freestyle relays.
The two individual titles were the first for West Ottawa’s program, and its third-place team finish was the highest in school history.
“Every single person has contributed to this,” Afrik said. “We are a big family at this school.
“And personally, I’m very proud of the two state championships because it’s never happened here. As a junior, I’ve helped push this team, and this day has been our goal. I’ve dreamed about this since I was a freshman, and the competition definitely helps. They pushed me to be my best today, and I’m grateful.”
The closest race of the day was the 100 backstroke, where Detroit Catholic Central junior Jack Walsh touched the wall four-hundredths of a second before Monroe sophomore Cameron Craig. Walsh won with in 49.08 seconds, while Craig – who set the LP Division I meet record with a 48.9 in the preliminary heat on Friday – finished with a 49.12.
“I felt like I was right next to him for the final 25 yards,” Craig said. “I had a couple people tell me that I had won. It was that close. Now I’ve got to train harder to beat him next year.”
Craig didn’t leave empty-handed. He won the 100 butterfly in 48.95, edging Brother Rice’s Kouvaris.
“I think I had a good finish,” Craig said. “I didn’t finish with my best times, but I put a lot of effort into this meet. I’ve been training since last year for it.”
Oakland University-bound John Schihl captured a 100 breaststroke in 55.39 seconds, missing the LP Division 1 meet record by eight hundredths of a second. Schihl finished second last year in the event in Division 3 while swimming for Lahser before it and Andover merged this fall.
“I had higher expectations, but this was bigger of a meet than we are used to,” Schihl said. “I did pretty well at keeping my focus. I knew this would be tough when we moved up to Division 1. It was a hard transition and a lot of practice to get here.”
Rockford sophomore Jake Herremans won the diving title with a personal-best score of 458, while Saline freshman Dakota Hurbis finished runner-up with 433.25 points. Herremans finished ninth at the meet as a freshman.
“I was one away from all-state and all-conference honors last year,” Herremans said. “I knew I’d be toward the top this year. I didn’t miss a dive after the preliminary dives.”
PHOTOS: (Top) A swimmer celebrates after finishing a race Saturday at Saginaw Valley State University. (Middle) The Brother Rice swimming and diving team celebrates with its championship trophy. (Click to see more from High School Sports Scene.)
Skyline Soars to 1st Finals Championship
March 10, 2018
By Jason Schmitt
Special for Second Half
YPSILANTI – The groundwork was laid Friday.
But the celebration was years in the making.
At the conclusion of the MHSAA Lower Peninsula Division 1 Boys Swimming & Diving Finals at Eastern Michigan University, Ann Arbor Skyline coach Mo-Jo Isaac performed a near-perfect back flip off the 3-meter diving board – something she’s been doing for years when her teams accomplish something special.
The occasion certainly called for the coach to take a dip in Jones Natatorium Saturday afternoon. The Hawks cruised past the competition, scoring 274 team points to top the field and bring home the first MHSAA championship in program history.
“Whenever my girls teams (at Skyline) would accomplish a milestone, or something big would happen, that’s kind of what we do,” said Isaac, who’s in her second year coaching the boys program. “Today, I had kind of forgotten about it, but a bunch of our girls were here to cheer on the guys and they were like, ‘No, Coach Mo-Jo, you’ve got to jump.’ ”
Skyline picked up wins in five of the meet’s 12 events, with senior David Cleason leading the way with a pair of individual titles. He was tops in the 200-yard individual medley, winning in a time of 1:49.81. He also bested the field in the 500 freestyle, where he edged out Livonia Stevenson’s Ben Rojewski with a time of 4:30.50.
Cleason’s teammate, Michael MacGillivray, was second in the 200 IM, while winning a title of his own in the 100 breaststroke (55.01). Both Cleason and MacGillivray were members of the team’s winning 400 freestyle relay, with senior Samuel Jyawook and junior Kyle Tschannen. Their winning time was 3:04.99, beating out runner-up Grand Rapids Forest Hills Central and third-place Harrison-Farmington Unified.
“It’s a dream come true,” said Cleason, who accounted for 40 points by himself and helped his team earn 50 more in the two relay events he swam. “Me and Michael (MacGillivray) have been dreaming about winning that 4x100 free relay and winning the team title for so long and now that we’re seniors, doing it and winning it in our last swim meet, it’s perfect.”
Skyline’s final individual event championship came in the 1-meter diving event. Junior Henry Schirmer repeated as champion, scoring 503.85 points to outdistance runner-up Cade Hammond of Brighton, who scored 448.45.
“I feel like we won the meet yesterday, even though no one scored a point,” Isaac said. “We talked about doing it as a team, and we couldn’t do it if everyone wasn’t there for each other. We were on fire yesterday and we qualified really well.”
Holland West Ottawa, which entered the Finals ranked No. 2 in the state behind Skyline, lived up to its ranking by finishing second with 207 points. The Panthers won two of the three relays and saw junior Derek Maas capture the 100 backstroke title. Maas, who finished runner-up in the event a year ago, left nothing to chance Saturday, winning in a time of 50.23, better than a second ahead of runner-up Parker Wasielewski of Livonia Stevenson.
Maas joined teammates Julian Barrios, Ryan Langdon and Khadin Soto on the Panthers’ winning 200 medley relay team (1:31.91). Langdon, Barrios, Jacob Boersema and Sam Smith took top honors in the 200 freestyle relay in a time of 1:24.54.
Forest Hills Central junior Henry Schutte repeated as champion in both the 50 and 100-yard freestyle events. His time of 20.01 in the preliminary Friday set an all-Division MHSAA Finals record in the 50. He nearly duplicated the feat Saturday, finishing with a winning time of 20.04. Zeeland’s Austin Mills was second in the 50, while Ann Arbor Pioneer’s Adam Orringer-Hau was runner-up to Schutte in the 100.
“I am beyond happy with everything I did today,” said Schutte, who helped his team to a fourth-place finish. “I have to thank my coaches, my family, my teammates, shoot, even the people in my races. We’re all pushing each other to do our best, and every race is so fun. I love it.”
Orringer-Hau, the top seed in the 200 freestyle, won the event in a time of 1:38.66. He was third at last year’s Finals.
Four-time reigning team champion Birmingham Brother Rice had its streak end, but not without a fight. The Warriors finished third, behind Skyline and West Ottawa, with 154 points. Senior Alex Margherio captured the lone individual title for Rice, winning the 100 butterfly in a time of 48.43. Howell’s Henry Bauer was second in a time of 50.09.
Northville finished fifth overall with 141 team points, with Ann Arbor Pioneer (131), Detroit Catholic Central (127), Saline (116), Zeeland (100) and Harrison-Farmington (81) rounding out the top 10.
PHOTOS: (Top) Skyline's Henry Schirmer rotates through one of his dives on the way to repeating as LP Division 1 champion Saturday. (Middle) Grand Rapids Forest Hills Central's Henry Schutte looks to the scoreboard as the other competitors in the 50 finish their sprints. (Click for more from HighSchoolSportsScene.com.)