Breslin Bound: Girls Report Week 10

February 6, 2017

By Geoff Kimmerly
Second Half editor

We’re getting late into this girls basketball season. But that hardly means everything is figured out, even as league titles are being awarded and tournament contenders are keeping an eye on possible opponents who could crop up down the road.

See Ypsilanti Community, which fell for the first time this season Saturday, to Muskegon. Or Goodrich and Byron, two Flint-area teams who also took unexpected defeats last week to Davison and Durand, respectively.

Bottom line: A lot of teams still have the chance to create an exciting finish this winter even as odds look stacked again them. Read on to learn about a few more that have stuck out in this week’s Breslin Bound report, powered by MI Student Aid.

Week in Review

The countdown of last week’s five most intriguing results:

1. Carson City-Crystal 35, Mount Pleasant Sacred Heart 32 – The Eagles broke the 19-game regular-season winning streak of the reigning Class D runner-up, and followed this win by also avenging its other loss this season to Merrill.

2. Detroit Country Day 60, Southfield Arts & Technology 51 – In a season of impressive wins, this one ranks right up there for the Yellowjackets, with the Warriors falling to 9-4 versus one of the state’s toughest schedules.

3. Williamston 74, East Lansing 47 – The Hornets have put together a strong run over the last two seasons, but this win over a 13-2 Class A team has to be among the most impressive victories during that time.

4. Detroit Edison PSA 43, Flint Hamady 39 – Sandwiched between losses to Class A Detroit Martin Luther King and Class B Country Day, DEPSA downed Class C Hamady, the only team of the three it could see again in the postseason.

5. Edwardsburg 57, Buchanan 39 – The Eddies backed up their status as a rising team in Class B by handing the first loss this season to Buchanan, which then fell again to rival Comstock in its next game. 

Watch List

With an eye toward March, here are two teams in each class making sparks: 

CLASS A 

Brownstown Woodhaven (11-3) – The Warriors have won eight straight and beat Wyandotte Roosevelt 53-51 last week to move into first place with the Bears in the Downriver League. Woodhaven finished second in the league last season to Allen Park, with which it split this winter.

Roseville (10-5) – The Panthers have won seven straight to clinch the Macomb Area Conference Silver championship. One more win will guarantee an improvement on last season’s 10-10 overall finish as well.

CLASS B

Detroit Country Day (13-0) – The Yellowjackets have come back from last season’s Semifinal loss to Grand Rapids South Christian on a tear. Last week might have been their best with the above-mentioned win over Southfield Arts & Technology and another over DEPSA, and Country Day is the only team that has beaten Detroit Martin Luther King.

Kingsley (10-3) – The Stags were quietly cruising to a solid season when they made a big wave by handing Kalkaska its first loss this season, 53-43, on Thursday. The victory also tied Kingsley’s win total for all of last season. 

CLASS C 

Homer (12-3) – The Trojans trail leader Springport by two wins in the Big 8 Conference but have a win over the Spartans and see them again Tuesday. They also see second-place Jonesville again next week, controlling their destiny as they look to repeat as league champions.

Kingston (13-2) – A quarterfinalist in Class D last season, Kingston is continuing its surge but now in Class C. The Cardinals sit first in the North Central Thumb League and have won nine straight since falling to still-undefeated Sandusky in December.

CLASS D

Custer Mason County Eastern (12-2) – The Cardinals have doubled up last season’s six wins in taking the lead in the West Michigan D League. A 61-60 win over Bear Lake on Thursday avenged one of those two losses this winter.

Waterford Our Lady (12-2) – Coming off making the MHSAA Semifinals last season, the Lakers are building for another run with 11 straight wins after opening 1-2. Those losses, though, came against arguably the Class B favorite in Country Day and 12-win Class A Clarkston.

Can't-Miss Contests

Be on the lookout for results of these games coming up:  

Monday – Marquette (14-1) at Houghton (15-0) – From a strong group of Upper Peninsula teams, these might be the best in addition to being among the largest of likely MHSAA title contenders from that side of the bridge.

Tuesday – Birch Run (11-3) at Frankenmuth (11-4) – The Eagles needed a two-point win over Millington on Thursday to run their Tri-Valley Conference East win streak to 105, but the Panthers may present the toughest challenge of this season.

Tuesday – Sandusky (14-0) at Reese (13-1) – The Thumb has some of the state’s best Class C teams, and these might be the top of the crop, with one undefeated and the other winners of 13 straight. 

Tuesday – Marine City (13-1) at Ypsilanti Arbor Prep (15-0) – This is a matchup of top Class B teams in the state, with Marine City getting a chance to show it’s in the title mix along with one of the most discussed contenders.

Friday – DeWitt (14-1) at Lansing Waverly (10-4) – The Warriors on Jan. 4 handed DeWitt its only loss, and a sweep would all but give Waverly the Capital Area Activities Conference Red title.

PHOTO: DeWitt, here in a win over Mount Pleasant, can avenge its only loss this season when it takes on Lansing Waverly on Friday. (Click for more from HighSchoolSportsScene.com.)

2005 Miss Basketball DeHaan Cherishing Newest Title: 1st-Time Mom

By Dean Holzwarth
Special for MHSAA.com

July 25, 2022

JENISON – Allyssa DeHaan-Clark remains one of the greatest shot blockers in national high school and college basketball history.

Recently, the former Grandville High School and Michigan State University standout became a  mother for the first time.

DeHaan-Clark, and her husband Aaron, adopted a baby girl last September.

Bradley Noelle Clark was born on Sept. 29, 2021, at 36 weeks.

When the Clarks found out about the impending delivery, they drove straight to the hospital from their vacation in Tennessee to meet her. They took her home a few days later.

“Parenthood is awesome, hard, wonderful and beautiful,” DeHaan-Clark said. “She’s 9½ months old, and she just lost her first tooth and is starting to crawl. She says, ‘Da, Da’ a lot, even though I’m with her most of the time during the day.”

DeHaan-Clark, who turned 34 last month, married in 2012. She and her husband had aspirations to raise a family.

Unfortunately, the road to parenthood was more difficult than they envisioned.

“We tried to get pregnant for six years,” DeHaan-Clark said. “We went through a lot of testing and different fertility procedures, but nothing took. We never had one positive pregnancy test.”

Although disappointed and frustrated, the Clarks pursued another avenue.

“Adoption was always in the back of our mind, and it came to a point where I didn’t know what to do,” DeHaan-Clark said. “One night we prayed to God for clarity and wisdom and just some direction. He answered that prayer the next morning with a text message, and that put us on a fast track to adoption.”

Grandville basketballThe Clarks went through the application process last June. Four months later, Bradley was born. She officially became a Clark in May.

“It was awesome for God to answer that prayer so quickly,” DeHaan-Clark said. “After six years of struggle, she was meant to be in our family. We love her so much and adore her to pieces.

“She’s loved by so many, and we are very thankful that the birth family chose us. After all that pain and suffering, God made something beautiful through that.”

DeHaan-Clark was a four-year towering presence at Grandville. As a junior in 2004, she set the MHSAA record for blocks in a single season with 236 and averaged nearly a triple-double (27 points, 13 rebounds and 9.5 blocks per game).

As a senior, she helped lead the Bulldogs to a 25-2 record and their first Class A Semifinal appearance. She was named the 2005 Miss Basketball Award winner by the Basketball Coaches Association of Michigan.

DeHaan-Clark grew six inches during middle school and entered her high school freshman year at 6-foot-6. She was 6-9 as a senior before taking her talents to East Lansing.

“Middle school was tough for everyone, but it was extremely tough for me,” DeHaan-Clark said. “I was entering a new school system, and I had just started playing basketball a year or two before that and had a huge growth spurt. Learning how to be coordinated and play the game took a while.”

DeHaan-Clark was a part of three consecutive Ottawa-Kent Conference Red championship teams. The Bulldogs won District and Regional titles in 2005 before defeating previously-unbeaten Benton Harbor in a Class A Quarterfinal. Grandville’s run ended with an overtime loss to Southfield-Lathrup in the Semifinal at Breslin Center.

“My senior year was the best,” DeHaan-Clark said. “It was so much fun with the championships and all the wins. Playing with the same girls for four years and then finally having a successful team was amazing.”

DeHaan-Clark made the MHSAA’s single-season scoring list as a senior with 710 points, having averaged 26.3 per game that fall. She also finished with 718 career blocks, setting an MHSAA record later broken by Kalamazoo Central’s Asia Robeson (723) in 2014. Still, DeHaan-Clark remains seventh all-time nationally for career blocks, with Robeson sixth on the list.

DeHaan-Clark arrived at Michigan State with high aspirations.

“I had big goals of playing in the Olympics and playing professionally, but obviously those didn’t come to fruition,” she said. “I learned to dream big, so I set big goals from the beginning.”

DeHaan-Clark emerged as a dominating shot blocker for the Spartans, and was Big Ten Freshman of the Year in 2006-07 as she set the conference record with 145 blocks.

As a sophomore she re-established the Big Ten record for single-season blocks with 150. She was named Big Ten Defensive Player of the Year as a senior in 2009-10.

She ended her career as Michigan State’s all-time blocks leader with 503 – with that total also second in Division I history at that time and now third on the NCAA DI list – to go with career averages of 12.1 points and 6.8 rebounds per game.

“It was a big transition from high school to college, but I wanted to be a contributor,” DeHaan-Clark said. “I had amazing coaches and teammates, and my freshman year turned out better than I thought it would.

“My big goal was to be a key defensive player and break as many records as I could with blocked shots because of my height.”

In 2009, DeHaan-Clark was the catalyst in Michigan State’s run to the Sweet 16. The Spartans upset top-ranked Duke in the second round before losing to Iowa State, 69-68.

But DeHaan-Clark suffered a back injury during the Big Ten Tournament that winter which ultimately ended her hopes of playing beyond college.

“I never recovered from that, so I didn’t enter the WNBA draft,” DeHaan-Clark said. “I ended up having back surgery and finished my remaining classes before graduating.”

DeHaan-Clark returned home and worked in the medical field while also helping lead a sports ministry program at Grand Valley State University.

Grandville basketballShe received an intriguing opportunity to continue playing college sports as part of the Lakers volleyball program.

“I needed to take more graduate classes, and I had one more season of college eligibility other than basketball,” she said. “My skill level wasn’t to the level of basketball, but it was still really fun to play and compete and be a part of a team because those are things I still love doing today.”

DeHaan-Clark changed her focus from medicine to continuing her work in sports ministry, as well as for a non-profit organization.

She also got her real estate license in 2015, and she and her husband began flipping houses on the side.

“It brings me a lot of joy to cast a vision of what a home could look like after a lot of blood, sweat and tears,” she said. “I love that kind of work.”

The projects allowed the Clarks to spend meaningful time together.

“It was a lot of nights and weekends, and we just had to learn things as we went,” DeHaan-Clark said. “The one thing we learned is we cannot do drywall. It’s not our skill set, so in order to save our marriage and our relationship we would hire it out.

“We did a lot of it ourselves, and we like seeing the transformation from old to new. It’s really fun, and hopefully we can do it again.”

The Clarks currently reside in Jenison and have been embraced by their community and friends. They live on a lake, enjoying water sports in their free time. Allyssa was inducted into the Grandville High School Athletic Hall of Fame in March.

As for the future, DeHaan-Clark said nothing is set in stone.

“We take it one day at a time,” she said. “I still have my real estate license, so we’re hoping to renovate and invest. I’m sure in the future there will be more kids added to the Clark clan, but right now we’re very happy and content with just one.”

2021-22 Made in Michigan

July 21: Championship Memories Still Resonate with St. Thomas Star Lillard - Read
July 14:
Portage Central Champ Rolls to Vanderbilt, Writing Next Chapter in Alabama - Read
July 12: Coaching Couple Passing On Knowledge, Providing Opportunities for Frankfort Wrestlers - Read
June 30: Hrynewich's Star Continuing to Rise with Olympic, Pro Sports Arrivals - Read

PHOTOS (Top) At left, Allyssa DeHaan puts up a shot during Grandville’s 2005 Class A Semifinal against Southfield-Lathrup. At right, the Clark family including Allyssa, husband Aaron Clark and daughter Bradley. (Middle) DeHaan looks for an open teammate while playing her high school finale at her future college home, the Breslin Center. (Below) The Clarks enjoy a moment together. (Basketball photos from MHSAA archives; Clark photos courtesy of Allyssa DeHaan-Clark.)