Carlson Raises Bar with Perfect Run
March 1, 2014
By Dean Holzwarth
Special to Second Half
GRAND RAPIDS – Gibraltar Carlson senior Sarah Tritt was sporting three shiny MHSAA championship rings on her left hand following Saturday’s competitive cheer Division 2 Final.
She soon will be adding another one to the collection.
“Yes, we are going to be designing our fourth one,” Tritt said after the Marauders captured their fourth consecutive Division 2 crown at The DeltaPlex.
Gibraltar Carlson tallied a three-round score of 780.10, while Dearborn Divine Child placed runner-up for the fourth year in a row with a 772.24 total. Allen Park finished third at 769.06.
The Marauders continued their string of dominance in Division 2. They have won the Finals six of the last eight years and were runners-up in 2010.
“It never gets old,” Gibraltar Carlson coach Danielle Jokela said. “I think that these kids did something that was close to impossible – they won four state titles in a row.”
In fact, the Downriver League champions never lost a competition this season – an impressive feat in itself, especially considering the league includes four MHSAA Finals qualifiers and three-time reigning Division 1 champion Southgate Anderson.
“This is the first season that I’ve ever coached an undefeated team where they have won every single competition,” Jokela said. “They fought hard, they did everything I asked them to do, and today they became state champions.”
Tritt joined teammates Alexis Kopchia and Maelyn Russo as the only seniors to compete on the mat all four years at the Finals.
“This feeling is indescribable,” Tritt said. “It’s like nothing I could ever imagine, and I could not ask for anything more. We were able to overcome so much this year and we pushed through it all and still were able to end on top every time.”
Senior Kiah Manthei agreed with her coach – winning championships never gets old.
“No, it feels better every time,” Manthei said. “This year’s team is the best that we’ve had. There was no drama and we’re all really close. We just knew today that if we performed how we practiced, that it was ours.”
Gibraltar Carlson charged to an early advantage with a pair of dominating rounds.
It posted high scores in Round 1 (234.9) and Round 2 (230.1).
“Round 1 has been our saving grace this year and is amazing, and we have very talented girls in Round 2 who have beautiful skills,” Jokela said. “Getting those high scores definitely boosted our confidence and kept us ahead. That’s what won the state title for us.”
The Marauders held a nearly eight-point cushion entering the final round.
“It’s always good to be a little ahead after Rounds 1 and 2,” Tritt said. “It makes it so much easier going into Round 3.”
Gibraltar Carlson registered a 315.1 in Round 3, which was the third highest among the eight teams.
“We nailed the first two and Round 3 was good enough to seal the deal,” Jokela said.
Dearborn Divine Child, which won the Detroit Catholic League title, trailed Gibraltar Carlson by four points after Round 1 despite scoring a solid 230.2 to open the Final.
It had another superb Round 2 (226.84), and capped the day with the second-highest Round 3 score (315.2).
“It was their goal today to hit three perfect rounds, and really, at the end of the day, we don’t have any control over anyone else or what the judges give us or anybody else,” Falcons coach Amber Genevich said. “They haven’t hit three perfect rounds all season and they did that today. We would’ve loved to finish first, but we’re proud because not many teams here can say that they hit solid rounds, and we did.”
While the frustration of placing runner-up again still lingered, Genevich said this year’s team peaked at the end of the year.
“You get a little tired of being second best, but this year’s second place feels a little different than maybe last year,” she said. “We weren’t a second place team all season. We were third place or fourth place, so we had to work from the bottom and really climb our way to the top.”
PHOTOS: (Top) Gibraltar Carlson athletes look into the crowd during Saturday’s Round 2. (Middle) Dearborn Divine Child performs its Round 3 routine. (Click for action and team photos from Hockey Weekly Action Photos.)
Meridian Grows with Seniors Into Contender
By
Paul Costanzo
Special for MHSAA.com
February 12, 2019
Katie Blanchard knew she and her Sanford Meridian competitive cheer teammates had something special even before they placed fourth at the 2016 MHSAA Division 4 Final.
Now that the six freshmen who made up the bulk of that team are seniors, everyone else knows it, too.
“We’ve been in it since we were really, really young – as early as you could do cheer,” said Blanchard, who is one of those seniors. “We’ve all been, all the seniors anyway, we’ve all been together that long, and we knew we had something special. Because we’re all friends, too, we knew we would all stay in it.”
Blanchard and her classmates McKenna Burns, Aubrey Erskine, Tana Spangler, Becky O’Dell and Elizabeth Melchi have all stayed in it, and after leading Meridian to a program-best finish a year ago (second), they have the Mustangs among the highest-scoring teams in Division 4 as the postseason approaches.
Meridian put up a total score of 774.02 this past Saturday at the Cheer on the Lake competition in Houghton Lake. It’s the highest score for any Division 4 team this season by nearly 10 points, and Meridian’s highest by nearly 15. With the District competition scheduled for Saturday in Vassar, the Mustangs believe they’re peaking at the right time.
“We’re still getting better throughout the season, and I don’t think we’ve peaked yet,” Burns said. “Our team and our coaches know that, too. We still have goals that we set every week, every practice. We’re still working hard on perfecting our skills.”
Meridian has been improving its scores throughout the season, as – outside of a slight blip at Alma College Spiritfest – they have been trending upward. And even when it looked like scores had plateaued a bit, with 759.98, 724.82, 759.44 and 757.06 coming in consecutive meets from Jan. 19 through Feb. 5, the Mustangs took things to a new level at Houghton Lake.
“We’ve just been practicing for the last week like it’s our District tournament,” Meridian coach Val MacKenzie said. “They went out with a bunch of dedication and fire in their blood that they wanted to win. Our Round 3, everything was just rock solid. They came together and performed well, and that was the highest score we’ve had in Round 3, which is 317.5.”
MacKenzie said that one of the team’s slogans, and one that the Mustangs used between rounds even as they were rolling toward a state-best score, is “You’re better than that.” That theme of constantly improving was on display at the team’s next practice, as MacKenzie invited a cheer official this past Monday to critique the team as it went through its routine.
“It’s good having somebody come in and look at us and say, ‘You guys are there, there’s just some little tiny things you can do to make yourselves better,’” MacKenzie said. “After a while with the girls you’re coaching, sometimes you say things and it goes in one ear and out their other. But when somebody else says it, then it sinks in like, ‘Oh yeah, Coach did say that.’”
This group of 16 athletes – 14 who are back from last year’s Finals runner-up – doesn’t need much outside motivation, however, and hasn’t since March of 2018.
“Last year, after we won Districts and Regionals, it really hit us that we really had a chance,” Burns said. “We worked so hard, and to get so close – we were excited to get second, and we still got a trophy and were recognized. Second place is pretty good for our little school in the middle of nowhere, especially since we didn’t have any seniors. Now, we’ve worked this hard, we’re not going to let it fall off.”
Part of the motivation is knowing how close the competition is, and Meridian is very aware of that. While Saturday’s score is nearly 10 points clear of the division’s second-best, Pewamo-Westphalia owns the best season average in the division at 741.3, while Meridian is second at 739.5.
While they’re paying attention, the Mustangs know they can only control their own routine, which is why Burns said the team is working on even the smallest things.
“That’s the hardest part, you can’t expect them to fall or can’t expect them to mess up,” she said. “You have to depend on yourselves and your own teammates. You’re not going to be able to control anything over the other team; you’re just able to control what you do.”
MacKenzie can count on her seniors to make sure the entire team gets that message, as they have a lot of experience in that leadership role. Since they were sophomores, those six have been the oldest competitors on the team.
“It was a lot of pressure, and our sophomore year we didn’t really do that well, in my opinion,” Blanchard said. “It was difficult, but we had enough prior experience to be good. The seniors that were on the team when we were freshmen, they really whipped us into shape. There were only three seniors when we were all freshmen, so we grew up fast.
“Throughout the years, you learn so many lessons. Sophomore year was a really tough year. Last year, we took second, and that was such a huge change. Each year, going to state, we’ve learned how to deal with the pressure and just really how to perform.”
Everything seems to be coming together at the right time for the Mustangs, and their coach is confident they’ll perform when needed.
“They’re just a phenomenally talented team,” MacKenzie said. “I don’t think I have to worry about them losing their momentum. They can almost reach out and touch it; it’s right there. But you have to keep your act together. You can’t think that you’ve won.”
The Mustangs have taken that to heart and are focused on finishing what they started years ago.
“That would just be absolutely amazing,” Burns said. “Especially for us seniors, we’ve been working so hard, and we just want to go out with a bang.”
Paul Costanzo served as a sportswriter at The Port Huron Times Herald from 2006-15, including three years as lead sportswriter, and prior to that as sports editor at the Hillsdale Daily News from 2005-06. He can be reached at [email protected] with story ideas for Genesee, Lapeer, St. Clair, Sanilac, Huron, Tuscola, Saginaw, Bay, Arenac, Midland and Gladwin counties.
PHOTOS: (Top) Sanford Meridian’s competitive cheer team takes to the mat during a meet this season. (Middle) The Mustangs have posted the highest overall score of this winter in Division 4. (Photos courtesy of the Sanford Meridian competitive cheer program.)