Performance: Gaylord's Reagan Olli
February 23, 2019
Reagan Olli
Gaylord junior – Skiing
Despite a broken left wrist, and cast covering it, Olli won the giant slalom at the Division 2 Regional at Nub’s Nob in a two-run 54.94, and also qualified for Monday’s MHSAA Finals in the slalom in earning the Michigan Army National Guard Performance of the Week.
Olli suffered the wrist injury while racing in Duluth , Minn., a few weeks earlier and she anticipates wearing a cast into early March. But that won’t stop her from attempting to repeat as the Division 2 champion in the slalom, although the wrist has given her a little more pain in that race because competitors cross-block – or make contact with the gates – which they do not in the GS. She finished seventh in the slalom at last week’s Regional in 127.10 and expects to contend in both races Monday at Boyne Mountain. She finished second in the giant slalom at the 2018 Finals.
Olli also is the goalkeeper for Gaylord’s varsity girls soccer team and anticipates being ready to block plenty of shots once that season gets rolling in the spring. She’s considering the possibility of competing in either sport in college after she finishes up high school next year and also carries a GPA above 4.0 that ranked her among the top five students in her graduating class academically heading into this school year. Of course, she has plenty of time to decide, but is interested in the medical field and considering studying to become a physician’s assistant.
Coach Bill Snow said: “I’ve had the privilege of coaching Reagan for three years. Reagan is a dedicated, committed, talented, humble, accomplished, skier. Not only is she a superb skier on the hill, she is an exceptional young adult off the hill. She is also a major asset to the Gaylord High School ski team because she motivates and inspires her peers. During dryland training, when Reagan was a sophomore with a hand injury from soccer, she looked at me and said, ‘I want to be the state champion, and champions need to work hard.’ She accomplished this goal last year at the 2018 state meet when she won the slalom title and placed second in GS. This year she will go into the 2019 state meet with another battle scar, a broken hand, but that won’t stop her one bit! I look forward to watching her effortlessly fly down the hill to another victory.”
Performance Point: “I had broken (the wrist) the Sunday the week before,” Olli said. “So I had tried to get a little bit used to it during the week once I got casted. I just tried to practice, and mostly my goal going into Regionals was just to try to ski clean. I wasn’t really aiming for a win that day. At that point it was still awkward-feeling because normally you’re used to having a lot of wrist motion for pole touching and getting out of the start gate, but that day I just had to go with what I had.”
Big Monday ahead: “I’m a little bit nervous just because I wish I was at full strength. There’s nothing I can do about it now, so I’m going to go forward and try to put my best skiing out there and work with what I have. I don’t know the amount of time it’s been affecting me right now, but as far as skiing itself now, I think I’m still in contention with all of those girls. It’s just a matter of getting my good skiing out. The starts at Boyne Mountain are a bit flatter, which will be tougher, so I’ll have to make up some time.”
I love it all: “I’ve always been a skier. I started skiing at the little hill in Gaylord when I was probably 2. My mom’s family is big on skiing, so I was always out there. I did a bunch of other sports when I was a kid; skiing has just always been what I wanted to be doing. I worked my way up in different programs, and I got here. … There are so many things I love about it. I love the way it feels going down the hill. It’s so different all the time – there’s not one course ever the same as the other. We’re always on different hills, and you have to adapt and learn to ski different places and in different ways. I love the atmosphere around it as well. You can make so many new friends. It’s a great feeling to be out there skiing … (and) I like the cold.”
Overseas slopes: “I went to Austria this fall with a group from Traverse City, so I know a lot of girls from TC West and TC Central. It was great. The views out there were incredible, and the hills were a lot steeper, so that was a cool experience. And we were on a T-bar the whole time, so we just got lap after lap and we skied for so many hours.”
Setting up senior year: “I’m more of a go-with-the-flow kinda person. I want to try to do some bigger races in the FIS (International Ski Federation) part of the sport. As far as state and Regionals go, I would like to be back on top and in contention for titles. My goal for senior year, I guess, would be to be healthy, because it definitely helps.”
- Geoff Kimmerly, Second Half editor
Every week during the 2018-19 school year, Second Half and the Michigan Army National Guard recognizes a “Performance of the Week" from among the MHSAA's 750 member high schools.
The Michigan Army National Guard provides trained and ready forces in support of the National Military Strategy, and responds as needed to state, local, and regional emergencies to ensure peace, order, and public safety. The Guard adds value to our communities through continuous interaction. National Guard soldiers are part of the local community. Guardsmen typically train one weekend per month and two weeks in the summer. This training maintains readiness when needed, be it either to defend our nation's freedom or protect lives and property of Michigan citizens during a local natural disaster.
Past 2018-19 honorees
February 14: Jake Stevenson, Traverse City Bay Reps hockey - Read
February 7: Molly Davis, Midland Dow basketball - Read
January 31: Chris DeRocher, Alpena basketball - Read
January 24: Imari Blond, Flint Kearsley bowling - Read
January 17: William Dunn, Quincy basketball - Read
November 29: Dequan Finn, Detroit Martin Luther King football - Read
November 22: Paige Briggs, Lake Orion volleyball - Read
November 15: Hunter Nowak, Morrice football - Read
November 8: Jon Dougherty, Detroit Country Day soccer - Read
November 1: Jordan Stump, Camden-Frontier volleyball - Read
October 25: Danielle Staskowski, Pontiac Notre Dame Prep golf - Read
October 18: Adam Bruce, Gladstone cross country - Read
October 11: Ericka VanderLende, Rockford cross country - Read
October 4: Kobe Clark, Schoolcraft football - Read
September 27: Jonathan Kliewer, Grand Rapids Forest Hills Northern soccer - Read
September 20: Kiera Lasky, Bronson volleyball - Read
September 13: Judy Rector, Hanover-Horton cross country - Read
PHOTOS: (Top) Gaylord's Reagan Olli skies during her team's Division 2 Regional last week at Nub's Nob. (Middle) Olli won the giant slalom and also qualified for the Finals in the slalom. (Photos by RD Sports Photo.)
Notre Dame Prep Extends Reign with 3-Peat
February 23, 2021
By Andrew Rosenthal
Special for Second Half
HARBOR SPRINGS — Craig McLeod — quite literally — coaches state championship teams.
McLeod, Pontiac Notre Dame Prep and the Fighting Irish girls made it a three-peat Monday afternoon at the MHSAA Division 2 Ski Finals at Boyne Highlands. The third-year ski coach won his third girls championship after helping break the program’s 13-year title hiatus with the first of this string in 2019.
Before winning three Finals titles in a row (and every divisional and Regional meet during those three seasons) Notre Dame Prep had last won a girls Finals championship in 2006.
Teams north of the 45th parallel typically dominate the alpine ski meet, but now downstate teams have claimed four of the last five Division 2 girls titles as Grand Rapids Forest Hills Central won in 2017. Notre Dame was runner-up in 2017 and 2018 before its three-peat began.
“These girls have really worked hard,” McLeod said through tears. “You think about it, they've been putting their ski boots on like six or seven days a week since Thanksgiving. That takes a lot of work and a lot of focus.”
For a school with an enrollment of roughly 635 students, McLeod said 51 athletes (girls and boys combined) on this year's team was impressive. And there’s more to come. Three of Notre Dame’s four all-state finishers Monday are sophomores including slalom champion Sydney Schulte.
“We're drawn from our JV team and continuing to work and grow with our sophomore team,” McLeod said.
Schulte, who won slalom with a time of 1:27.14 and took fourth in giant slalom with a time of 1:00.11, said the girls she’s been around have felt more like a family than a team.
“I definitely think that there's more to come,” Schulte said. “It'll be kind of challenging that we're losing a little bit of the team, but I definitely think that there are some good people coming up on our team, and it's definitely not going to end.
“I just kind of thought about what I was working on in practice and just got rid of all the nerves and just laid it down.”
McLeod said four titles in a row is certainly a big challenge, but he knows his skiers are up for it.
“They are a bunch of great, hard-working young ladies that are really smart, get great grades and do well in every aspect of their life,” McLeod said. “It's fun to be a part of being with them and coaching them and helping them to be better people and create memories they'll have the rest of your life.”
Lowell’s Kaylee Byrne edged out Cadillac freshman Onalee Wallis for the GS title by 13 hundredths of a second after beating her in the Regional meet last week. All medalists in the GS were separated by less than a second, and that list also included fellow Vikings freshman Avery Meyer.
“She’s sneaky fast,” Cadillac coach James Netzley said of Wallis. "It's been a long, long time since we've had a Cadillac girl finish that high … so yeah, that was impressive. That was really impressive."
East Grand Rapids finished team runner-up with 115 points — a newcomer to Finals hardware in skiing. Cadillac tied Petoskey with 130 points for third place in Division 2, beating the Northmen in a tiebreaker because its fifth racer had a better finish. Last year Cadillac finished in sixth place, but the Vikings returned three members of that team.
PHOTOS: (Top) Pontiac Notre Dame Prep’s Sydney Schulte makes her way past a gate during one of her title-winning slalom runs Monday. (Middle) Lowell’s Kaylee Byrne races to the championship in the giant slalom. (Click for more from Sports in Motion.)