QB Follows Mentors in Leading Montague
October 4, 2017
By Tom Kendra
Special for Second Half
Sebastian Archer didn’t have to look far to find role models as Montague’s starting quarterback.
Pat Collins, Montague’s 14th-year head coach, was the quarterback who first brought the Wildcats to the promised land, culminating a dream season at the Pontiac Silverdome with a 12-7 loss to powerhouse Detroit dePorres in the 1992 Class CC championship game.
Cody Kater, now the Wildcats’ quarterbacks coach, took it a step further and led Montague to back-to-back Division 6 titles with wins over Leslie (41-20) in 2008 and Monroe St. Mary Catholic Central (24-21) in 2009.
“I’m pretty lucky that I get to learn from both of them every day,” said Archer, a 5-foot-9, 175-pound junior who is off to an impressive start, following in the footsteps of recent Montague quarterbacks Jacob Buchberger and Dylan Stever. “They push me pretty hard, but I know it’s only to make me better.”
Archer will try to glean all he can from Collins and Kater this week, as the 6-0 Wildcats (ranked No. 3 in Division 6 by The Associated Press) prepare to host 5-1 Muskegon Oakridge (ranked No. 6 in Division 5) in a key battle for the West Michigan Conference championship and playoff seeding.
Montague has bolted to its 6-0 start behind one of the highest-scoring offenses in the state, averaging 57 points per game. Collins said the key for his team to stay unbeaten with a grueling final three games against Oakridge, Ravenna and then Montague’s first-ever meeting against unbeaten and four-time reigning Division 8 champion Muskegon Catholic Central, is for Archer to continue his dynamic play while taking care of the ball. Archer has thrown for 945 yards, 12 touchdowns and just two interceptions.
“Sebastian distributes the ball well and makes good decisions,” Collins said. “We anticipated having a good team this year and hoped to be in the position where we are right now, but this is where things get really tough and we’ll see what we’re made of.”
While Archer is continuing the Montague tradition of strong quarterback play, he is a completely different style of QB than his two mentors.
Collins engineered the tightly-packed, wing-T offense during his playing days, which usually meant about one or two passes per game.
Kater was more of a prototypical pocket passer, standing 6-4 and throwing 79 touchdown passes over his career. Kater played college quarterback at University of Cincinnati, Grand Rapids Community College and finally Central Michigan. He worked his way up to the starting job for the Chippewas as a junior, but broke his collarbone in the first quarter of CMU’s 2013 season-opening game against Michigan in “The Big House.”
Archer, meanwhile, is described by Collins as more of a “point guard” on the football field.
“He is definitely a dual threat,” Collins said. “Like a good point guard, he is capable of taking it into his own hands if need be. But first and foremost, he’s looking to get our other guys involved.”
That supporting cast, many like Archer part of Montague’s loaded junior class, has been stellar through the first two-thirds of the season.
Bryce Stark is explosive out of the backfield, rushing for 625 yards and 13 touchdowns this fall. Kenyan Johnston is the team’s most prolific receiver, highlighted by his nine catches for 129 yards and two touchdowns in a thrilling 46-44 win at rival Whitehall on Sept. 22. The main downfield threat is burner Jake Jancek.
For the past 40 years, the road to the WMC title has gone through Oakridge, a perennial playoff team which has qualified for the postseason 21 of the past 22 years and won MHSAA championships in 1997, 2005 and 2008. The main rival for Oakridge for many years, particularly the 1990s, was Ravenna, but since the turn of the century the biggest challenges have come from the White Lake area duo of Whitehall and, especially, Montague.
Montague edged Oakridge 29-26 two years ago and led 28-14 last year at Oakridge before the Eagles rallied for a 31-28 win.
Archer expects another classic game.
“I can’t wait for Friday night,” said Archer, who, in addition to his quarterback duties, starts at safety and punter and hold on kicks. “It will probably be like the Whitehall game where the stands are full and people are sitting on the grass. Those are the games we love to play in.”
Part of the reason for the year-in, year-out success at Montague and Oakridge is coaching stability. Montague has had just two head coaches in the past 32 years, with Ken Diamond coaching from 1986-2003 and Collins from 2004 to present. Oakridge has had an even longer stretch with just two head coaches, led by Jack Schugars from 1979 to 2010 and now Harger from 2011 to present.
Montague has made the playoffs in 12 of 13 seasons under Collins, with the back-to-back championships in 2008 and 2009 capping an amazing stretch which saw the Wildcats make it at least to the Semifinals five straight years from 2005 to 2009.
Getting back to that elite level is what motivates Archer to come in to “Camp Kater” on Monday and Friday mornings before school. Kater emphasizes building up arm strength on Mondays, and switches the focus to pocket awareness on Fridays. Those sessions have transformed Archer from a running back playing quarterback to a well-rounded QB, Collins said.
Archer grew up idolizing Kater in small-town Montague, but he lists his favorite professional quarterbacks as Tom Brady and Doug Flutie, the 5-10 quarterback who was an inspiration to little guys everywhere. Flutie retired in 2005 when Archer was just 4 years old.
“The roster lists me as 5-9, but I’m 5-7; I’m not gonna lie to you,” said Archer, who also plays basketball and baseball for Montague. “I’ve watched old films of Flutie, and I love how he found a way to make things happen even though he was a little guy. That’s what I try to do.”
Tom Kendra worked 23 years at The Muskegon Chronicle, including five as assistant sports editor and the final six as sports editor through 2011. E-mail him at [email protected] with story ideas for Muskegon, Oceana, Mason, Lake, Oceola, Mecosta and Newaygo counties.
PHOTOS: (Top) Montague junior quarterback Sebastian Archer, a true dual-threat for the unbeaten Wildcats, looks for running room Sept. 22 during his team's 46-44 victory over rival Whitehall. (Middle) Archer tries to throw over 6-4 Whitehall defensive end Brandon Rake; Archer completed 14 of 20 passes for 217 yards, four TDs and no interceptions in the win. (Below) Montague coach Pat Collins played quarterback for the Wildcats in the early 1990s, leading them to the Class CC championship game in 1992. Collins, now in his 14th year, has a 121-38 record at Montague, highlighted by back-to-back MHSAA titles in 2008 and 2009. (Photos by Tim Reilly.)
Martin Caps Frantic Final Minutes with Unforgettable Comeback at Superior Dome
By
Jason Juno
Special for MHSAA.com
November 18, 2023
MARQUETTE --- Martin had it easy last year, at least from a stress and anxiety standpoint.
Sure, the 8-Player Division 1 Final was competitive in the first half, but Martin went on to win the championship game by 50 points, hardly anything to sweat too much about.
But this year?
Oh goodness.
Martin took possession of the ball on its own 15-yard-line with 1:15 on the clock and trailing by two scores, 26-14, to an Indian River Inland Lakes team determined to win its first Finals title on the football field.
And Martin won. A state title game for the ages, the Clippers claimed it 30-26 to repeat as champions despite also trailing 20-0 to start the fourth quarter.
It was still a 20-point margin, 26-6, when the Bulldogs scored what seemed to be the insurance points they needed with 6:26 left.
“It’s amazing,” Martin coach Brad Blauvelt said. “I’m not gonna lie – doubt creeps into your head when it’s 20-6, they’re driving down the field, they’re running the clock. … We made plays, we made plays when it counted the most.”
Inland Lakes built its big lead with a stout red zone defense – Martin got there on every one of its possessions but didn’t cash in until the final quarter – and a four-touchdown day from junior quarterback Aidan Fenstermaker.
It was the first Finals appearance for Inland Lakes, which had its two winningest seasons over the last three years. Coach Travis Meyer’s message to the team after such a heartbreaking loss was about focusing on getting here – no easy feat itself – and about the upperclassmen guiding the rest of the team so that their run of success isn’t complete.
“No one in the state, based on any rankings, based on any newspaper articles, based on anything really, expected us to do what we did,” Meyer said. “And then even the ones that weren’t totally shocked that we were here didn’t think it was going to be a four-point game. Regardless of when the points were scored, that’s still a four-point game, that’s a hell of a state championship. That could have gone lots of different ways, and I don’t think anybody really expected us to give them a shot.”
They certainly did that. Martin, though, had an epic response.
The Clippers scored quickly, going 70 yards in a minute and a half, with Haylen Buell’s one-yard touchdown run pulling the Clippers within 26-14 with 4:54 left.
The Bulldogs recovered the Martin onside kick attempt and marched right into the red zone on the ensuing drive. But they turned it over on downs with 1:33 left.
That meant Martin had to go 85 yards just to pull within one possession with the clock even more daunting than the distance.
It took them a minute. The Clippers capped the drive as Taegan Harris caught a 10-yard scoring pass from Gavin Meyers with 33 seconds to go. The conversion pass made it 26-22.
Everything came down to the onside kick by sophomore Ben Romero. The bouncing ball went off at least two Inland Lakes players before Martin’s Mike Branch recovered it.
Martin had tried an onside kick after its previous two scores as well, but this was the only one that worked.
“They timed it perfect,” Meyer said. “That kid has a heck of an onside kick, it gets there at the same time as his kids. Whether you’re ready for it, whether you’ve got your best athletes there or not, that’s hard to do, especially on a stage like this, in that moment. That is hard on anybody, even the pros.”
The Clippers took over at their 45 with 32 ticks on the clock. Before long they were at the 21.
Meyers looked to pass, scrambled and then ran 21 yards for the touchdown with five seconds remaining.
“It was a pass play, trying to get it to Abe (Dykstra),” Meyers said. “The middle opened up, and I just took off.”
He said he was just hoping to get out of bounds, with the clock running down, but he was able to get in the end zone.
“We thought we could keep them out for two more plays,” Meyer, the Bulldogs’ coach, said. “We lost contain somewhere there around the edge.”
The unfathomable score: 30-26 after the conversion.
Martin lost a lot of seniors from last year, including three all-staters. The Clippers didn’t win their conference, and they fell to 2-2 early in the year with losses to Bridgman and Gobles. They haven’t lost since, though, winning nine straight games with a young team.
“It’s nice to be able to leave a legacy,” said Harris, a senior. “Last year, we had a pretty stacked group of guys. We had three of our star players injured this season, it wasn’t looking good, 2-2, then we won, what, nine, eight straight? … It feels really good.”
Meyers, who threw for 216 yards and ran for 142 on Saturday, filled in for one of those all-state graduates quite well, J.R. Hildebrand.
“He’s a damn good football player,” Blauvelt said of Meyers. “And he’s grown a bunch. Halfway through the year, he started moving in the pocket, keeping his eyes downfield. You saw it today, right, he kept his eyes downfield.”
After a scoreless first quarter, Inland Lakes scored twice during the second quarter. The Bulldogs took over for the final drive of the half at their own 12 with 3:05 remaining. They went for it on 4th-and-6 at their own 31 and again on 4th-and-6 at the 47. They converted both and were rewarded with a touchdown as time expired. Despite being pressured, Fenstermaker hit Jacob Willey in the corner of the end zone for a 24-yard touchdown pass that put Inland Lakes up 14-0 at the half.
Meyer said his team punted once this year and once last year.
“We don’t put a ton of time into punting,” he said. “So when the best we can do is maybe get off a 25-yard punt and they return it 10 yards before we cover it, we figured that was only 15 yards of field position anyway, so we might as well give ourselves a shot. It was playing the odds. Maybe people don’t like that logic, but we like to play aggressively. We like to see what we can do.”
They built the lead to 20-0 late in the third quarter as Martin came up empty on all four of its drives, even though every one of them got into the red zone.
“It was very frustrating,” Blauvelt said. “We saw on film, they stopped Pickford (in the Semifinal) inside the red zone multiple times, they tightened up when they got in there. We shot ourselves in the foot in the first half. But we moved the ball consistently, but yeah, that was a little frustrating. We had some good drives, and we just couldn’t punch them in.”
It just wasn’t as frustrating as the finish was for the Bulldogs.
Inland Lakes senior Payton Teuthorn said getting to this point was what they wanted since youth football.
“We made it here. We just couldn’t finish,” he said.
PHOTOS (Top) Martin players celebrate with their fans Saturday the program’s second-straight 8-Player Division 1 championship at Superior Dome. (Middle) Martin quarterback Gavin Meyers charges toward the end zone on the way to scoring the game-winning touchdown. (Below) Inland Lakes’ Andre Bradford (20) pulls in a catch as two Martin defenders converge including Bryer Watson (2). (Click for more photos by Cara Kamps.)