Preview: Powerful Teams, Potential Record Setters Ready to Set Pace
By
Geoff Kimmerly
MHSAA.com senior editor
March 10, 2022
An anticipation of dominance accompanies this weekend’s Lower Peninsula Boys Swimming & Diving Finals.
In Division 1, Ann Arbor Pioneer is loaded with high seeds as it attempts to repeat as champion. A closer team race is expected in Division 2, but Ann Arbor Skyline enters with similar high-seed credentials. And East Grand Rapids is the favorite again in Division 3 as its seeks Finals win No. 27. At least three relay records appear in the running to be broken, and we’ll say good-bye to some accomplished individual standouts including a pair of past champions in Division 3.
Preliminaries at all three Finals sites begin at noon Friday, with swimming and then diving, with Saturday championship events starting at noon. Tickets cost $11 each day and may be purchased for Divisions 2 and 3 exclusively at GoFan. (Division 1 tickets were assigned two per participant.) Both days of all three meets will be streamed live and viewable with subscription on MHSAA.tv.
Here’s a glance at team and individual favorites:
LP Division 1 at Holland Aquatics
Reigning champion: Ann Arbor Pioneer
2021 runner-up: Holland West Ottawa
2022 top-ranked: 1. Ann Arbor Pioneer, 2. Northville, 3. Holland West Ottawa
The Pioneers have been considered the favorites to repeat all season long. They enter this weekend top-seeded in all three relays with five more top seeds over their 20 total individual entries seeded to score. West Ottawa, the 2019 champion, is expected to be back in the mix at the top with all three relays and six individual entries seeded to score. Northville jumped into the second spot in the final coaches association rankings and has a strong case with all three relays and 13 individual entries seeded to score. Pioneer and Northville also both have one diver competing.
Joshua Brunty, Saline senior: The top seed in the 100-yard breaststroke (57.02) also may swim on two top-four seeded relays. He was second in the breaststroke last season and swam on winning and runner-up relays. He also finished 13th in the 50 freestyle and will swim that again this weekend.
Ryan Gurgel, Canton junior: After placing third in the 200 individual medley and ninth in the 100 butterfly in 2021, he enters this weekend the top seed in the 200 freestyle (1:41.96) and seventh in the butterfly.
Ryan Hume, Ann Arbor Pioneer senior: Last season’s champion in the IM and runner-up in the 500 freestyle is the top seed in both at 1:50.92 and 4:33.39, respectively.
Kevin Maas, Holland West Ottawa senior: He won the 50, tied for second in the 100 free and swam on the winning 200 freestyle relay as a junior, and returns this weekend as the second seed in the 50 (21.14) and breaststroke (57.79) while likely also swimming on two of three third-seeded relays.
Gabriel Sanchez-Burks, Ann Arbor Pioneer junior: He competed at last season’s Finals in the 50, finishing 19th in qualifying, but he’s moved all the way up to having the top seed in that race this weekend (21.05) and the eighth seed in the 100.
Fletcher Smith, Huron Valley United senior: The reigning champion in the butterfly and seventh-place finisher in the 200 free, Smith is seeded fourth in the 200 (1:42.85) and third in the butterfly (50.35) this weekend.
Jack VanHowe, Rochester senior: The reigning champ in the backstroke is seeded first in that race (48.62) and third in the 100 free (46.19) after tying with Maas for second in that race a year ago.
Jack Wilkening, Ann Arbor Pioneer senior: He’ll look to build on his third place in the 100 backstroke and seventh place in the 50 from last season entering this weekend as the top seed in the 100 free (45.88) and second seed in the backstroke (49.17).
Robert Yang, Ann Arbor Pioneer senior: He’s the top seed in the butterfly (50.08) and 11th in the 50 and likely to swim on two top-seeded relays after finishing eighth in the butterfly and ninth in the 100 free in 2021.
Ann Arbor Pioneer’s 200 free relay: The expected lineup of Sanchez-Burks, seniors Harrison Sanders and Alex Farmer and Hume have a seed time of 1:23.97 that would rank as fifth-fastest in LPD1 Finals history and is just more than a second off the all-Finals record of 1:22.8 swam by Bloomfield Hills Brother Rice in 1996.
Alex Poulin, Waterford United junior: Last season’s third-place diver won his Regional this time by 80.45 points with the highest score, 469.75, at any Division 1 Regional by 23.45.
LP Division 2 at Oakland University
Reigning champion: Birmingham Seaholm
2021 runner-up: Grosse Pointe South
2022 top-ranked: 1. Ann Arbor Skyline, 2. Grosse Pointe South, 3. Detroit U-D Jesuit
The preseason and midseason rankings both read Jesuit, South, Skyline, respectively, before Skyline jumped to the front heading into this week. Skyline was fourth in Division 2 last season and last won a Finals in 2018 in Division 1. Two of three Eagles relays are top seeded, as are four individual entries, and combined all three relays and 16 individual entries are seeded to score. South has all three relays and 11 individual entries seeded to score, plus the top-scoring diver from Regionals. Jesuit, which finished third last season, has all three relays and 11 individual entries seeded to score. Skyline also has a diver competing.
Christian Bouchillon, Detroit U-D Jesuit senior: He’s the top seed in the backstroke (50.17) and 10th in the IM after finishing 10th in the IM and fourth in the backstroke last season.
Charlie Bruce, Detroit U-D Jesuit senior: He won the 50, finished fourth in the 100 and swam on the winning medley relay in 2021, and enters this weekend seeded second in the butterfly (50.32) and fifth in the 50 (21.38).
Gianni Carlino, Grosse Point North senior: The reigning champion in the 500 is seeded first (4:39.51) in that race and second in the 200 free (1:43.30) after finishing sixth in the 200 last year.
Drew Collins, Detroit U-D Jesuit senior: He’s the reigning champ in the backstroke and was fourth in the 200 free last season. He enters this weekend seeded second in the backstroke (51.02) and fifth in the IM (1:55.67).
Michael Grover, Byron Center senior: The reigning breaststroke champion is seeded first (56.08) in that race and eighth in the IM after taking seventh in the latter last season.
Ben Kurniawan, Ann Arbor Skyline senior: He returns after finishing fifth in both the butterfly and IM in 2021. He’s seeded first in the butterfly (49.50) and second in the IM (1:54.42) with a chance at a pair of relay records as well.
Matthew Lee, Ann Arbor Skyline senior: He’s seeded first in the 50 (20.66) and second in the 100 free (45.61), coming off a 12th in the 50 last season. He also could be part of two record relays.
Evan McKelvey, Ann Arbor Skyline senior: He finished seventh in the 100 and fifth in the 200 as a junior and returns this weekend as the top seeds in both (49.69 and 1:39.77, respectively) and a possible leg of both record-pursuing relays.
Drew Vandeputte, Grosse Point South senior: He finished ninth in the IM and seventh in the breaststroke last season while also swimming on a winning relay. He returns as the top seed in the IM (1:54.30), fifth in the breaststroke (57.34) and as part of a top-seeded medley relay.
Ann Arbor Skyline’s 200 freestyle relay: The expected lineup of McKelvey, junior Jack Staunton, Kurniawan and Lee enters with a seed time of 1:23.69, which would best the LPD2 record by four tenths of a second.
Ann Arbor Skyline’s 400 freestyle relay: McKelvey, freshman Lucas Caswell, Kurniawan and Lee have a seed time of 3:04.36, which would break the LPD2 record by 37 hundredths of a second.
Logan Hepner, Grosse Pointe South junior: Last season’s diving runner-up won his Regional by nearly 55 points with a score of 548.15, the best at any Division 2 Regional by 49.05 points.
LP Division 3 at Calvin University
Reigning champion: East Grand Rapids
2021 runner-up: Holland Christian
2022 top-ranked: 1. East Grand Rapids, 2. Holland Christian, 3. Bloomfield Hills Cranbrook Kingswood
East Grand Rapids will look to add to its record 26 Lower Peninsula Finals championships, making the short drive with all three relays and 12 individual entries seeded to score plus the reigning Finals champion diver and another competing. Holland Christian will attempt to take back the top spot after most recently winning back-to-back in 2018-19. The Maroons also have all three relays and 12 individual entries seeded to score, plus two divers competing. Cranbrook most recently won four straight Finals from 2014-17, and finished third last season. The Cranes have all three relays but only seven individual entries seeded to score – although two are top seeds.
Erik Bolang, Pinckney senior: This will be his second Finals as he swam the IM and 500 as a freshman, and Bolang enters this time as the top seed in the IM (1:54.84) and second seed to teammate Tyler Ray in the butterfly (49.66). He’s also slated to swim on the top-seeded medley relay.
Charles Brown, Spring Lake senior: He’s hoping to take the final step after finishing second in both the 50 and butterfly last season. Brown is seeded first in the 50 (20.54) and third in the butterfly (49.68).
Andrew Dobrzanski, Milan senior: The reigning breaststroke and IM champion also won the former as a sophomore and set the LPD3 Finals record in that race of 54.67 last season. This time he is seeded first in the 200 free (1:41.56) and second in the breaststroke (56.26).
Tyler Ray, Pinckney senior: The reigning butterfly champion could double or triple his individual championship number as the top seed in both that race (48.89) and the backstroke (50.34). He’s also part of that top-seeded medley relay.
Ethan Schwab, Bloomfield Hills Cranbrook Kingswood junior: Last season’s runner-up in the 500 and breaststroke (and a medley relay champion), Schwab is seeded first in both individual races in 4:43.42 and 55.59, respectively.
Ben Sytsma, Grand Rapids Christian sophomore: He finished seventh in the 50 and swam on three scoring relays as a freshman, and this weekend enters as the top seed in the 100 free (46.41), second in the 50 (21.06) and as part of top-seeded 200 and 400 freestyle relays.
Charley Bayer, East Grand Rapids senior: The reigning champion diver posted a score of 520.80 to win his Regional by 97.3 points and pace all of Division 3 by 38 points.
PHOTO A pair of swimmers launch side-by-side during a relay at last season's Lower Peninsula Division 1 Finals. (Click for more from HighSchoolSportsScene.com.)
Longtime Coach's Legendary Expertise Keeps Manistee Surging
By
Tom Spencer
Special for MHSAA.com
November 19, 2021
Name any high school or community pool in Michigan, and odds are Corey Van Fleet has been there.
Perhaps it is true of any pool in the United States.
He might have even helped build it.
And, a little more odds. If the pool hosted an MHSAA Finals meet, one of Van Fleet’s teams likely participated. Although he won’t have any qualifiers making the trip to the Division 3 girls meet Friday, he’s been to championship weekend lots of times with Birmingham Seaholm and Manistee. His 1962-65 Seaholm boys teams won four straight Class A Finals, and his Manistee boys team is coming off a Finals trip last winter and its best season ever.
Van Fleet, now 85 years young, is in his 68th of coaching swimmers. He’s spent the last 13 with the boys and girls teams of Manistee High School. He started the program after helping build the pool.
The school utilizes the Paine Aquatics Center named after Bill Paine, who presented a proposal to the City of Manistee, the Manistee Area Public Schools and Van Fleet. Paine’s proposal called for the pool, which opened in July 2009, to be attached to the high school facilities.
“So I’m sitting in my office one day and this tall, lanky guy (Paine) walks in and closes the door and says my wife and I want to donate an aquatics complex in Manistee, and Sandy Saylor says you know something about swimming,” Van Fleet recalls. “‘Will you help me build it?’
“We talked about it for a while and I said yeah, I’d help him,” Van Fleet continued. “So we ended up with a nice eight-lane swimming pool in Manistee.”
Van Fleet, who also had coached at Florida State, coached and served as athletic director at Oakland University and then served as AD at Long Beach State (Calif.) during an illustrious career at the college level, took the next step naturally.
“The superintendent of schools at the time (Robert Olsen) said you build the darn thing, you might as well get some programs started,” Van Fleet recalled. “That was 13 years ago, and I’m still at it.”
At it, Van Fleet continues. He plans to stay with it until he just can’t do it anymore.
“I am still fairly healthy,” he said. “If I can find six people that can carry me out of church, I can think about quitting.”
During his tenure at Manistee, Van Fleet’s teams have dominated the Coastal Conference and produced multiple academic all-state swimmers. The boys team captured the 2020 academic all-state title with a 3.82 team grade point average.
“I am most proud, I think, about our academic progress,” Van Fleet said. “We take great pride in passing some classes.”
Van Fleet is also filled with pride when he reflects on all the swimmers he’s seen go on to become lawyers, doctors, teachers, engineers and coaches.
“I am pleased with the number of kids who have gone on to do some pretty big things in the world off our swimming programs,” he said. “I’d like to think they might have learned lessons about goal planning and sticking to it and hard work and all that stuff.
“That’s what lights me up.”
Van Fleet’s initial high school coaching job was at Madison Heights in 1959. He’s coached at camps all over Michigan, including his first at Burt Lake in 1954. Today he owns and operates a summer swimming camp in Irons, 30 miles southeast of Manistee. He also built it.
Jeff Brunner, a veteran MHSAA official in multiple sports including swimming, and father of former members of the Traverse City high school swimming co-op, is among many singing praises of Van Fleet’s impact on the sport.
“Corey has a wealth of information that he has accumulated in his coaching career,” Brunner said. “If I was a high school swimmer, I’d want to learn all I could from him – swimming for him would be such a unique opportunity.”
Andrew Huber, principal of Manistee’s middle and high schools, agrees with Brunner.
“We're humbled to have had Corey as part of our school and community,” he said. “His wealth of experience, knowledge, and relationship building has helped create a foundation of well-being for students and adults alike.
“His enthusiasm for swimming is infectious, and his energy is amazing for anyone regardless of age,” he continued. “It's been truly impressive to observe him connect and inspire students for the many years he's been in Manistee, and realize his impact is generational.”
The Manistee boys swim team starts practice next week. The Chippewas, along with their girls squad, have battled through COVID. The pandemic is one of many changes through which Van Fleet has guided his athletes.
“We’ve seen changes in training methods,” he said. “We’ve seen changes in diet.
“We’ve seen changes in philosophies in terms of what’s important and what’s not important,” he went on. “Kids have changed, and parents have changed.”
Training methods have been modified the most, along with new multi-lane pools popping up in Michigan, Van Fleet noted.
“Swimming is more technical now,” he said. “The science of swimming has become paramount.
“It is not just going in and kick a few legs and swim a few hundreds and go home — we’ve gone the gamut,” he continued. “It is very specific now every time you want a kid to do something, and now our swimming pools are showplaces – they are magnificent.”
Tom Spencer is a longtime MHSAA-registered basketball and soccer official, and former softball and baseball official, and he also has coached in the northern Lower Peninsula area. He previously has written for the Saginaw News, Bay County Sports Page and Midland Daily News. He can be reached at [email protected] with story ideas for Manistee, Wexford, Missaukee, Roscommon, Ogemaw, Iosco, Alcona, Oscoda, Crawford, Kalkaska, Grand Traverse, Benzie, Leelanau, Antrim, Otsego, Montmorency, Alpena, Presque Isle, Cheboygan, Charlevoix and Emmet counties.
PHOTOS (Top) Corey Van Fleet (far right) visits with his Manistee girls team the wall honoring him at Oakland University. (Middle) Van Fleet is in his 68th year coaching swimming. (Photos courtesy of the Manistee girls swimming & diving program.)