Practice Pays in Another Marian Title
February 24, 2014
By Andy Sneddon
Special to Second Half
HARBOR SPRINGS – Familiarity breeds contempt.
And championships.
Rob Rhoades and his Bloomfield Hills Marian ski team made several trips north this season to familiarize themselves with the steep and tricky terrain at Nub’s Nob.
Those journeys paid off, again, on Monday as the Mustangs won the MHSAA Division 2 Girls Skiing Final, edging runner-up Houghton-Hancock, 74-81.
“This year we really committed a lot of extra training on the weekends,” Rhoades said. “We came up here and trained often – hard, long weekends, cold weekends. This was probably the busiest season I’ve had coming Up North.”
It was the third title in five years for Marian, which began its regimen of regular yearly training visits north during the mid 2000s. The Mustangs won their first MHSAA ski title in 2010 and repeated in 2011.
Coincidence? Not at all.
“The extra training and coming up on the weekends, that’s the big thing,” said Rhoades, who completed his 25th year as Marian’s coach. “It makes a big difference. The mechanics of skiing on a hill like this versus downstate at Alpine Valley (near Milford) is totally different. There’s a lot of G forces on the back and a lot more pressure on the ski (at Nub’s). You have to be a stronger skier too."
Petoskey senior Mia Ciccoretti was the individual slalom champion, while sophomore Carlee McCardel of Traverse City St. Francis-Elk Rapids repeated as the giant slalom winner.
Marian was led by Kat Streng and Breann Lunghamer. Streng finished eighth in the GS and 14th in the slalom; Lunghamer was third in slalom, 12th in GS. Teammate Paige Weymouth was 11th in GS.
McCardel edged Mallory Eliopolous of Grand Rapids West Catholic to earn a repeat as the GS champion.
McCardel, a student at St. Francis, said one of the biggest challenges she faced came earlier in the season, when the weight of carrying an MHSAA championship began to mount.
“I (felt the pressure) at the beginning of the season, but then my coach kind of sat me down and was like, ‘You’re not defending a state championship, you’re pursuing another one,’” she said. “It helped me just kinda calm down.”
She also drew on something she picked up from Michigan State football coach Mark Dantonio.
“Mark Dantonio (said) pressure is good, stress is not,” she said. “So I had to look at it more as that pressure is good and not get stressed out. I looked at it that way, and it made me work harder.”
Ciccoretti closed a standout career on top after finishing second a year ago to Mandy Haferkorn of Kingsley in the slalom final. Haferkorn placed fourth on Monday.
“I watched video from last year, and I was like, ‘Why did she beat me?’” said Ciccoretti, who finished fourth in the GS on Monday. “I figured out how to go faster, and it worked. I just trained a lot.”
Much of that training came at Nub’s, site of Petoskey practices and most home meets. Still, it’s a hill on which Ciccoretti said she isn’t all that comfortable.
“We do train here every day,” she said. “But I’ve had some bad experiences on this hill. I’ve fallen a couple times. It was good to get back from all of those.
“The key was really to just stay calm, don’t really let the nerves get to me. Just go out there and know my capabilities and just go from there, just have fun with it rather than think about what could go wrong or what could happen. Just do it, like I do every day.”
Sydney Reynolds of Grand Rapids Forest Hills Central finished second to Ciccoretti in the slalom.
Eliopolous, Reynolds, Tia Esposito of Harbor Springs and Nora Reed of Spring Lake joined Ciccoretti as double medalists.
PHOTO: Bloomfield Hills Cranbrook-Kingswood's Julia Briggs puts the brakes on one of her runs during Monday's MHSAA Final.
TC Central Takes Back Top Spot
February 26, 2013
By John Raffel
Special for Second Half
BOYNE FALLS – Traverse City Central coach Jerry Stanek just smiled when he was congratulated after his girls ski team won the MHSAA Division 1 championship Monday at Boyne Mountain.
“I didn't do anything,” he grinned. “I just watched.”
After five straight second-place finishes at Finals, the Trojans hoisted the championship trophy for the first time since 2005.
“I think the girls got the monkey off their backs for a while, and hopefully we can keep it going,” Stanek said.
“The key was belief from the girls that they could do what they did. After you finish second for so many years, and that happened to us in the 1990s, it takes a while. But when you win, it takes the monkey off your back and makes it easier. We try to prepare them the best we can, and hopefully they perform the way they should.”
Senior Monica Hessler of Traverse City West, last winter's team champ, won the girls slalom race while Mallory Slicker of Walled Lake Central prevailed in the giant slalom.
TC Central had scores of 38 in the slalom and 43 in the giant slalom for an 81 total. Walled Lake Central was second at 56 and 36 for 92 while Marquette was third at 69 and 44 for 113, Birmingham Marian fourth at 54 and 62 for 116 and Traverse City West fifth at 67 and 61 for 128.
Rochester Adams finished sixth at 170, Fenton/Linden seventh at 203, Walled Lake Northern eighth at 273 and Brighton ninth at 283.
“I would think that we were probably favored coming in,” Stanek said “We had some problems in the slalom, and it wasn't our best performance of the year. But I think the state championship reflects that when teams get together and have to compete. I was proud of our girls, the way they came back and stayed with it even though after our first run in slalom, we could have been out of the race for the day.”
Hessler competed on last year's team champion for TC West. Her previous best individual finish was a sixth in the slalom.
“I knew I had a shot at it,” Hessler said. “There's probably eight girls who also had the same chance. We've all been back and forth all season.”
Shannon Weaver led the TCC effort with seconds in both the slalom and giant slalom.
In the girls GS, Cassidy Klein of TCC was 11th, Paige Phannenstiel was 14th, Molly Whiting 21st, and Devon Dotterrer 26th.
In the girls slalom, TCC' netted an 11th place from Madison Ostergren, while Molly Whiting was 13th, Dotterrer 15th, Phannenstiel 18th and Cassidy Klein 38th.
Hessler knew what was at stake, but said she still simply wanted to have fun. She also saved her best for last.
“I knew it was my last race, so I wanted to give everything possible,” she said. “I knew it was going to be a close race, which it was.
“We're a young team this year,” Hessler added. “Our other girls are young, and they're great skiers, but they're young and definitely are going to be a team to watch for the next couple years.”
Shannon Weaver of TC Central was second in the slalom at 1:05.77 followed by defending champ Kelsey Griffin of White Lake Lakeland at 1:06.84, Slicker fourth at 1:09.03, Hanna Johnson of Marquette at 1:09.89, Haley Goeckel of Marian at 1:10.57, Hannah Brassell at 1:10.65, Kathryn Streng of Marina at 1:12.59, Lauren Rhoads of Fenton at 1:13.43 and Lauren Henry of Adams at 1:13.56 to round out the top 10.
Hessler will look back at the 2012-13 as having exceeded her expectations. “This is unreal,” she smiled.
Those sentiments were shared by GS champ Slicker, a senior. She was third last year in giant slalom.
Slicker was coming off a torn meniscus in her right knee. It was her first time on skis in a few weeks
“I really didn't think I was going to be able to,” she said. “I had been on crutches.”
Weaver also was runner-up in the giant slalom at 1:03.31, followed by Abigail Ellis of Kenowa Hills/Lowell/Comstock Park at 1:03.88, Whitney Stilwell of Marquette at 1:04.4, Morgan Culp of TC West in 1:04.51, Hanna Johnson of Marquette in 1:04.60, Haley Goeckel and Kathryn Streng of Birmingham Marian in 1:04.65 and 1:04.67, Hessler in 1:04.75 and Taylor Krumm of Walled Lake Central in 1:05.01.
PHOTOS: (Top) Traverse City Central celebrates its first MHSAA team championship since 2005. (Middle) Marquette's Sam Zeigler races during Monday's Finals. (Click to see more at HighSchoolSportsScene.com.)