![Genesee Generals hockey coach Doug Towler, far right, celebrates his record 630th win with family Dec. 23.](/sites/default/files/2024-01/240110_hockey_2H.png)
Career Wins Record Reflection of Towler's Dedication to Genesee County HS Hockey
By
Paul Costanzo
Special for MHSAA.com
January 10, 2024
Jeff Rouse called his former hockey coach Doug Towler one of the most intense people he’s met.
“He was a (butt)-kicker,” Rouse said. “You knew Doug was the boss. If you weren’t listening in practice, you were skating, or he was breaking hockey sticks over the net.”
But when Rouse had the opportunity to attend a party celebrating Towler setting the MHSAA all-time coaching wins record recently, he and some of his former Grand Blanc teammates, who played for Towler during the 1980s, made sure to be there. And to see the emotion on Towler’s face as he walked into Madden’s Bar in Davison greeted by dozens of his former players made it more than worth it.
“I’ve got nothing but good things to say about Doug Towler as a coach, and even as a friend after,” Rouse said. “He’s always been a good dude. … We’re all just fortunate to have been blessed to skate for the man.”
Hundreds of players at Flint Northern, Grand Blanc, Davison and now with the Genesee Generals – a second-year co-op team with athletes from Davison, Flushing, Goodrich and Swartz Creek – have had the opportunity to play for Towler over his more than 40-year career. And on Saturday, Dec. 23, they all became part of history.
The Generals defeated Bay Area Thunder 3-2 that night, giving Towler his 630th career victory, sending him past Mike Turner of Trenton for most all-time for a hockey coach in Michigan.
Towler knew it was on the horizon, but didn’t want to bring attention to it – “That’s so Doug,” Rouse remarked – as he didn’t want to put extra pressure on his players.
But when he stepped into Madden’s, it all started to get to Towler.
“When I got to the party that they had, it was a surprise, obviously,” said Towler, who now has 631 wins. “I got there and I see the guys I work with at (IMA Brookwood Golf Club), and I see some old players, and it did kind of hit me a little bit. It was, honestly, it was great. It was a fun night. A couple of the (Flint) Powers coaches came over after their game, and there was a Grand Blanc coach there, and so it was a nice night. There were a lot of laughs, a lot of stories. And I’m sure, you know, over the years, those stories have gotten bigger.”
One doesn’t need to exaggerate when telling tales of Towler’s career, though.
The Sarnia, Ontario, native played college hockey at the University of New Hampshire and signed with the Chicago Blackhawks organization, playing in their minor league system for two years. His pro career took him to Austria, but he returned to North America to play for the Flint Generals of the International Hockey League. After one full season with the Generals and an injury-shortened second IHL season played in Flint and Saginaw, Towler joined the coaching ranks, taking over the Flint Northern program in 1979.
After two seasons at Northern, he spent a decade at Grand Blanc, winning three Regional titles between 1981-91. He took over the Davison program in 1992, and over his 30 years with the program he’s won eight Regional titles, made four trips to the Semifinals and two MHSAA Finals appearances.
VIDEO: Davison (@DavisonHockey) hockey coach Doug Towler talks to his team after they came back to beat Flint Powers 3-2 on Wednesday night. Brought to you by @MichHSHockey pic.twitter.com/XcS1yls750
— STATE CHAMPS! Michigan (@statechampsmich) January 11, 2020
“I played for him for three years, and I’ve known Coach Towler for a long time, and personal accolades were never on his radar,” said Albert Mitchell, who played for Towler from 2001-03 and helped Davison finish as Finals runner-up in 2002 and 2003. “He was always about wanting to make guys better hockey players, and better young men.”
It’s that philosophy that not only helped Towler win more games than any other hockey coach in the state – Traverse City Central’s Chris Givens is second among active coaches, and entered the season with 428 wins – but made so many former players want to be there for him when the milestone was celebrated.
“It’s safe to say that, for me, I don’t believe I would have ever played high school hockey if it wasn’t for Coach Towler,” said Mitchell, who went on to play at Elmira College in New York and is now the coach of the Fenton-Linden Area high school team. “Coach Towler is somebody that my dad respected and he wanted me to play for, and fortunately I did. I was fortunate to go on and play at the next level, and without Coach Towler, I don’t think I would have been able to do that.”
As fun as the party was, it came dangerously close to not being a celebration of a new record. The Generals led Bay Area 3-0, but allowed a pair of third-period goals that put the game in doubt. Assistant coach Ryan Welch, who had helped arrange the afterparty, said there were some extra nerves down the stretch.
“Was I nervous? Hell yeah, I was nervous,” Welch said with a laugh. “We had planned it two weeks before, and we played Friday and Saturday of that week, so we had to win both of them. We ended up winning 3-2 in Tawas and won 3-2 in Bay City. One of the coaches, Tony Perry, he rarely says anything, and he was chirping the whole game. I do think there was a little bit of nerves with everyone. Doug had his whole family here, and I’m sure our kids were nervous – we didn’t play the very best. Everyone was a little bit nervous because they wanted to be a part of this history.”
Welch, who played for Towler from 2002-06, is one of his three longtime assistants, although his 12-year tenure is much shorter than the others. Both Tony Perry and Charlie Eakes have been with Towler for more than 30 years.
Welch, Rouse and Mitchell all marveled at Towler’s ability to span multiple generations of athletes during his time as a high school coach. But they all are less surprised that Towler could pull it off, and more in awe of what he’s done.
“He’s had a lifelong commitment to the game of hockey at the high school level,” Welch said. “Usually, coaches start to have a little success and they move on. He’s had a lot of patience throughout the years. That tells you that he enjoys coaching these varsity athletes. It takes a tremendous person these days to stick with it. Over 40 years, the generations have changed, and he’s had to change the way he does things. It shows his love for the game of hockey, it shows his love for the community and his commitment to the Genesee County area.”
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.
PHOTO (Top) Genesee Generals hockey coach Doug Towler, far right, celebrates his record 630th win with family Dec. 23. (Photo courtesy of the Davison athletic department.) VIDEO Towler addresses his team after a 2020 win over Flint Powers Catholic.
![](/sites/default/files/imported/Photos/160312_D2_2H.jpg)
Hockey Team Becomes Romeo's Next Champ
March 12, 2016
By Bill Khan
Special for Second Half
PLYMOUTH — The students in the large Romeo cheering section might have been nervous.
Some of his teammates might have been getting nervous too.
Nolan Kare, however, couldn't allow himself to give in to the natural human reaction as the MHSAA Division 2 hockey championship appeared to be slipping away from the Bulldogs' grasp.
After scoring three straight goals during a frantic 5:02 stretch of the second period, a seasoned Livonia Stevenson squad held a 4-2 lead over a Romeo team that had never played on the biggest stage in Michigan high school hockey.
Kare stopped the last 11 shots he faced over the final 22 minutes and 21 seconds, backstopping Romeo to a 6-4 come-from-behind victory over Stevenson on Saturday at USA Hockey Arena.
"I know we kind of let up a little bit, but our team has so much heart," Kare said. "I know that if I just make the saves I'm supposed to make and try to rob a few that our team is going to give us the best chance to win. I know if I'm doing that, then I'm going to give them the best opportunity to put us in a position to get back."
Senior star Logan Jenuwine's tip-in goal during a five-minute power play with 10:21 left in the game snapped a 4-4 tie. Steven Morris scored an empty-net goal with 29.1 seconds left to seal the first MHSAA hockey title in the 15-year history of the Romeo program.
Suddenly, a school that had no MHSAA team championships going into the 2014-15 school year has three over the past 16 months. It began with the volleyball team winning the 2014 Class A championship and continued when the football team upset Detroit Cass Tech in the 2015 Division 1 title game at Ford Field.
"Before the game, we were saying if the football team could beat Cass Tech with 20 Division I (college) players coming up, we could beat Livonia Stevenson," Romeo senior forward Nick Blankenburg said. "Shocking the world and being part of such a great team feels incredible. To win a state championship for our school, to get those rings like our football team and volleyball team, I'll remember this my entire life."
Like the football and volleyball teams, the hockey team benefitted from a huge outpouring of support in a matchup that was witnessed by two passionate and energized fan bases.
"There's just something special about Romeo," said Kare, who finished with 29 saves and led the state with all 27 of Romeo's victories. "It's a small-town feel. You could see it out there. The entire town's out there for us. Just like football, just like volleyball, we had the whole community behind our back. We're just unbelievably blessed to have the best fan base, the best family, the best support out of anybody."
The atmosphere in which the Romeo and Stevenson players competed is one of the things that sets high school hockey apart from its competitors. Senior forward Ben Kowalske, who played in three MHSAA Finals for the Spartans, said neighbors will stop him and congratulate him on how the team is performing. Kowalske is the lone holdover from Stevenson's 2013 MHSAA Division 2 championship team and is a member of the MHSAA's Student Advisory Council.
"Being on the Council, you learn ideas and what other schools do," Kowalske said. "It's really amazing people are so interested in what we're doing. To have everyone come out to the game really means the world and really means a lot to us that we're doing something right here. You saw Romeo, too. They had the city support. It's cool. You try not to let it distract you during the game, but now that it's over, it's cool. It wasn't the outcome we wanted, but we did the best we could. It's really cool the community could come together over something and just forget about the world for a couple hours and just have fun."
A defensive battle that was tied 1-1 for the first 23 minutes changed in a hurry as the second period neared its midway point.
Romeo (27-2-1) grabbed a 2-1 lead at 6:18 of the second period on a goal by Jenuwine, but that only served to wake up the Spartans.
As Jenuwine's goal was being announced, Nick Beers scored the equalizer for the Spartans just 19 seconds later. Stevenson took its first lead 44 seconds later on a goal by Shane Leonard. Riding the crest of that momentum, the Spartans built their lead to 4-2 at the 11:39 mark on a goal by Nate Sudek.
With the game possibly slipping away, Romeo coach Nick Badder called what proved to be a critical timeout.
"We were down, they had all the momentum," Badder said. "I was telling (Adam) Krefski and the other assistants, 'Right now, they have all the momentum. We're on our heels, and we felt it. We calmed down the boys. Once they calmed down and realized it was shift by shift, we kind of took over."
Romeo got right back into the game before the second period ended, getting within 4-3 on Brett Lanski's second goal of the game with 2:34 left in the period and tying it when Luke Kaczor tipped in a shot from the point by Logan Ganfield with 1:30 to go in the period. Between the teams, six goals were scored during a 9:13 span.
Romeo was presented with a golden opportunity to break the tie when a Stevenson player received a five-minute major and game disqualification at 4:38 of the third period.
A power play that featured the highest-scoring player in the state wasn't going to miss over the course of five minutes. Jenuwine, who had 46 goals and 50 assists this season, scored what proved to be the game-winner at the 5:39 mark when he redirected a shot from the right point by Ganfield.
"It was going wide," said Jenuwine, who had two goals and three assists. "That's what I've been trying to work on mostly is get to the front of the net. I'm not really a guy to get to the front of the net; I did. It was a good shot by Logan Ganfield, and I got a tip on it."
Stevenson coach David Mitchell didn't blame the penalty for the loss.
"To say it turned there, it turned because they capitalized," Mitchell said. "They still had to capitalize, so you give them credit for capitalizing. We still had multiple chances to score and they had multiple chances to score. As a coach, it's so tough to explain to a bunch of 15-, 16-, 17-year-old kids that it's not one moment, it's an entire game. There were 51 minutes that were played out there where multiple other things happened."
Stevenson (22-7-1) had three offensive-zone face-offs in the final 1:25, but couldn't generate a scoring threat.
There might have been another had Morris' shot from inside his own blue line missed the target, but he found the center of the net for the game-clinching empty-netter with 29.1 seconds to go. For good measure, Morris blocked a shot in the final seconds.
Before Saturday, the Bulldogs' only playoff run beyond the Regionals came last season when they lost 8-2 to Grosse Pointe South in the MHSAA Quarterfinals.
"Last year's loss in the playoffs hurt," Badder said. "Grosse Pointe South took it to us; they kind of owned us. We didn't have a playoff game plan; we didn't have a playoff style last year. This year, I was so hard on these guys. We lost two games, and I was still, 'Guys, we're not doing this right, we're not doing that right.' They're like, 'Coach, we just won 6-1.' I was trying to get a point across to them that you've got to be a playoff team. You have to hit. You've got to block shots. You've got to get the puck in your own end. It's not the high-flying (Blankenburg) and (Jenuwine) show. We're a team, and the team will win in the end."
PHOTOS: (Top) Romeo players raise their first MHSAA championship trophy to the crowd after Saturday’s Division 2 Final. (Middle) Romeo’s Steven Morris (36) and Stevenson’s Sam Judd work to gain possession of the puck. (Click for more from Andrew Knapik.)