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D3 Semis: Contenders Survive Comebacks
June 13, 2014
By Kelsey Pence
Special for Second Half
EAST LANSING – Tinner Sharon’s chance at an MHSAA title was slipping through her fingers.
After giving up back-to-back home runs in the bottom of the seventh inning to lose a 4-1 lead, Sharon knocked a hit to left field and rounded the bases at full speed on a fielder’s choice by Sadie Strasser to give Gladstone its lead back.
With an injured ankle, Sharon then retired three in the bottom of the eighth inning to secure a 5-4 win over Coloma (34-10) in the Division 3 Semifinal at Secchia Stadium on Friday.
The senior pitcher was carried off the field as her team celebrated its fourth championship game appearance.
“All season we’ve had this motto of ‘never say die,’ and you never know what can happen in the bottom of the seventh, which was very important to (Coloma) today,” Gladstone coach Ashley Hughes said. “Tinner was struggling with her foot today, but she’s one incredible kid and definitely a leader for us.”
The Braves (29-2) had a 3-1 lead in the top of the seventh inning but scored on a balk to take a three-run lead.
But Coloma coach Wendy Goodline knew her team wasn’t completely out of it with Jenna Faultersack and Lexee Summers coming up.
“The two that got us back into it at the end are two of my hardest working girls,” Goodline said. “I’m not surprised that they were able to do that at all.”
Faultersack smacked a two-run homer with two outs in the bottom of the seventh inning, and Summers followed with a solo blast to left field to tie the score at 4-4.
“It was huge, but we had some solid hits throughout the day too that could have been brought in,” Hughes said of the balk. “The game can go either way, so thankfully everything was in our favor today.”
Sharon was able to score on a throwing error by the Comets to get the winning run.
“We thought about putting a runner on for her, but she got on base in the eighth and looked over and was like ‘Nope. That’s not happening,’” Hughes said. “She is just unbelievable. It takes something unbelievable like that to happen, and she was great for us today.”
Teammate Jess Beaudry agreed.
“She’s one of our quickest people on the field and with her ankle like that, that’s adrenaline, that’s her wanting to win so bad,” Beaudry said.
The Braves scored first in the top of the first inning when Strasser stole home on a missed bunt by Beaudry. They increased the lead to 3-0 when Lexi Hongisto tripled to right field and Beaudry brought her home with a home run to center.
“Nothing has felt better,” Beaudry said. “I can’t even tell you. I didn’t know it was gone at first, but I wanted to get my teammates in and it felt great.”
Coloma’s Katie Scheuer got on base with a hit to center field to start off the bottom of the fourth inning, and Kristin Potter brought her home with a single to right field to make it a two-run game.
Both teams were blanked in the fifth and sixth innings, and it looked like the Braves were going to cruise to the win when Sharon struck out the first two batters in the bottom of the seventh.
“That’s the name of the game,” Beaudry said. “We get some hits, they get some hits. You just have to get that momentum back when they have it.”
Bridget Becker added two hits for the Braves, while Potter tallied two for the Comets.
Sharon struck out seven for the Braves, giving up seven hits and walking four. Coloma pitcher Emily Najacht struck out four, walked two and gave up six hits for the Comets. Click for the full box score.
Unionville-Sebewaing 7, Clinton 5
Rachael Hahn belted a home run to right field in the top of the fourth inning, and Unionville-Sebewaing held off a late rally by Clinton en route to earning a trip to the Division 3 Final.
The Patriots, back in the championship game after finishing runner-up last season, had a 6-1 lead heading into the bottom of the sixth inning but saw it vanish quickly when Clinton’s Megan Nelson and Sarah Turner both smacked two-run homers.
“I think that just gave us more momentum,” Hahn said. “It fired us up. We knew those runs were coming; we just had to go out and get them.”
USA’s Kayla Gremel reached on a Clinton error in the top of the seventh inning and Jennifer Winchell brought her home with a double to deep center to give the Patriots some cushion.
Clinton’s Ashleigh Donahey got a base hit to start the inning for the Redskins, but the Patriots retired the next three to book their ticket for Saturday.
“For me, this is my first time being on the field for a state tournament as a senior. So that was really exciting,” Hahn said. “I think we are doing a lot better this year, and I think it’s because we are closer as a team. We’ve just had a lot of great team chemistry.”
Erica Treiber and Stephanie Neuman both had two hits for the Patriots. Treiber struck out 12 and walked just two from the mound in six innings of work. Nicole Bauer picked up the save.
Donahey had two hits for Clinton. Megan Burton took the loss, striking out six, giving up eight hits and walking one in seven innings of work. Click for the full box score.
PHOTOS: (Top) Gladstone’s Tinner Sharon connects during her team’s Division 3 Semifinal win Friday. (Middle) Unionville-Sebewaing’s Madison Zimmer prepares to apply a tag to Clinton runner Caitlyn Schuler in front of third base.
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Softball Gave Michigan Girls Opportunity
May 3, 2016
By Ron Pesch
Special for Second Half
In 1971, Jennifer Bradley, a 17-year-old senior at New Buffalo High School, attempted to play for the school’s varsity baseball team. Her request was rejected by the team’s coach. The story made national news.
Described as a better hitter than many boys, who could also run and field, Bradley was a player who local police chief and amateur baseball coach Dale Siebenmark felt would be an asset to any team.
Siebenmark wrote the Michigan High School Athletic Association on her behalf, asking for clarification on her status. Bradley was told, via letter, by the MHSAA rules committee that “girls cannot engage in sports where part or all the membership of a participating team is composed of boys.”
Because she was a senior, Bradley opted not to push beyond.
“I hope in the future other girls who are interested will pursue the matter of girls trying to get on teams,” said Bradley, inadvertently foreshadowing a change that would arrive. “But, they should start when they are freshmen.”
Into this environment was born an expanding array of MHSAA state tournaments for girls.
Outside regional tournaments in alpine skiing, started during the 1953-54 school year and staged for both boys and girls, gymnastics was the first sport for females to receive a statewide MHSAA-sponsored championship tournament. It began with the 1971-72 school year – the school year prior to the signing of the United States Education Amendments, which included Title IX, in July 1972.
MHSAA golf, tennis, swimming & diving and track & field championships were added for girls during the 1972-73 school year. Basketball arrived the following year. Skiing moved to a statewide championship in February 1975.
That spring also would see the first MHSAA Finals for one of the state's fastest-growing girls sports.
According to press reports, 182 high schools in the Great Lakes State had softball teams during the 1972-73 school year. One year later, the number had jumped to 331. With the announcement of the first MHSAA-sponsored softball tournament in the spring of 1975, the total increased again to 410.
“Some of the finest facilities in the state are being used for the championships,” noted the Detroit Free Press, indicating that this was the fifth anniversary of the MHSAA title games for baseball and the first for softball. “The Class A girls softball playoffs, for instance, are being played at Lansing’s Ranney Park, a fine outstate park for 40 years.”
It was one of four separate sites used for the final rounds of softball. Class B games were hosted at Dickinson Field in Kalamazoo, Class C games were held at Manchester High School and Class D at Plangger Field in Benton Harbor. Semifinal games were scheduled at 10 a.m., noon and 12:30 p.m., with the championship contests scheduled for 3 p.m., 3:30 or 4 p.m. of the same day, depending on the site.
In Class A, all-around athlete Mary Kay Itnyre (who in 2015 was inducted into Michigan State University’s Athletic Hall of Fame for her stellar college basketball career) tossed back-to-back no-hit games for Redford Bishop Borgess in regional play. Itnyre, a 6-foot junior, then added a third consecutive no-hitter as the Spartans topped Bay City Central in the Semifinals, 7-0. (Bay City’s girls wore volleyball uniforms that doubled as their softball uniforms, illustrating the inequality between the boys and girls athletics that existed at the time).
“If the Detroit Tigers ever begin drafting females, pitcher Mary Kay Itnyre may be the first on the list,” wrote a United Press International writer covering that first tournament.
Later in the day, Itnyre allowed only four hits as the Borgess girls downed Portage Central, 15-3, for the title. Itnyre opened the game with three innings of no-hit ball while Borgess pounded out 12 runs, including a home run by Sue Janus in the second inning. Lori Tremonti and Itnyre each added three hits for the victors. Ann Nolan had a two-run homer for the Mustangs in the seventh. Despite the loss, the opportunity to compete for a championship game capped a 24-year physical education career for Portage Central’s Jean Smith. Long an advocate for girls sports, Smith became the school’s first softball coach with the passage of Title IX.
Dearborn Divine Child finished the 1974 season with a 6-3 record, earning the “Best Sportsmanship” trophy from the Sterling Heights Women’s Softball Association. A year later, thanks to the changes in high school athletics, they were Class B state champions.
Catcher Sheryl Tominac notched two home runs and tallied six RBI as Divine Child crushed Grand Rapids Catholic Central, 14-2, in the Semifinal. Divine Child continued the offensive assault with 13 hits in a 14-4 pounding of Tecumseh for the title. Tominac again led the Falconettes with a single in the second inning, another home run in the fourth, and a triple in the fifth inning of the championship game.
The Detroit Catholic League continued its dominance of that first tournament, as Riverview Gabriel Richard pitcher Donna Dallos held Kalamazoo Christian to a single hit, a double by Lois Talsma, in a 5-0 victory in the Class C Final at Manchester. Mary Kay Raubolt went 2 for 4 in the game with a two-run single, while Maureen Dalton went 2 for 3 with a double. Dallos, team Most Valuable Player, finished the year with a 13-2 record and an ERA of 1.50. Gabriel Richard posted a 15-2 record on the season and earned the trip to the title game with a 14-5 win over Lakeview earlier in the day.
Freesoil entered the final weekend of softball competition with a flawless 35-0 record over three years of Western Michigan D League play. Trailing 9-8 in the seventh inning of the Semifinal game with Waterford Our Lady of the Lakes, the Pirates rallied for a 10-9 win and a chance at the Class D title. Their victory ensured that the Detroit Catholic League didn’t sweep the tournament.
Flint Holy Rosary entered the final inning of its Semifinal game leading 8-1 when Fowler erupted for five runs. According to Associated Press newspaper coverage, Fowler had the bases loaded with two outs when leftfielder Kelli Gerard “tossed out a runner at the plate following a bases loaded hit to nip a last inning rally,” to advance with an 8-6 victory.
In the championship game, Freesoil jumped out to a 2-1 lead behind junior Helen Shereda’s triple in the bottom of the first inning. Shereda, who pitched both the Semifinal and Final, would later become a three-sport star at Oakland University, where she earned All-America honors in basketball. Flint Holy Rosary quickly bounced back with four runs in the second inning to gain a 5-2 lead, then added three more at the top of the fifth, making it 8-2.
Freesoil bounced back with four runs in the bottom of the fifth, to pull within two, 8-6, but couldn’t grab the lead. Single runs in both the sixth and seventh innings by the Wolverines sealed the win, 10-6, and completed an incredible school year for the female athletes at Holy Rosary. Earlier, the Wolverines had won the MHSAA Class D girls basketball title, then represented Michigan in the U.S.A. Volleyball regional at Ball State University. (The MHSAA did not sponsor a volleyball state tournament until the winter of the 1975-76 school year.) The softball team included a number of athletes from the basketball and/or volleyball teams, including Gerard, Sally Lipp, catcher Patty Bentoski and pitcher Sandy Histed.
For Holy Rosary coach Anita “Jo” Lake – who had arrived as a volunteer in 1964, a year after the school’s opening – the season included yet another victory. After three operations, she had beaten breast cancer.
Since that first softball tourney, a host of other girls championship tournaments have been added by the MHSAA: Cross Country in 1979, Soccer in 1983, Competitive Cheer in 1994, Bowling in 2004 and Lacrosse in 2005.
Today, Michigan ranks 10th nationally in population, yet ranks 7th in girls and boys student participation in high school athletics. The numbers are truly impressive, especially when one considers them from the historical perspective of 45 years ago.
Ron Pesch has taken an active role in researching the history of MHSAA events since 1985 and began writing for MHSAA Finals programs in 1986, adding additional features and "flashbacks" in 1992. He inherited the title of MHSAA historian from the late Dick Kishpaugh following the 1993-94 school year, and resides in Muskegon. Contact him at [email protected] with ideas for historical articles.
PHOTOS: (Top) Redford Bishop Borgess was the first MHSAA Class A softball champion, in 1975. (Middle top) New Buffalo's Jennifer Bradley. (Middle below) Dearborn Divine Child won the 1975 Class B softball title. (Below) Riverview Gabriel Richard and Flint Holy Rosary won the Class C and D titles, respectively, in 1975.