Multi-Sport Standouts Again Helping Watervliet Diamond Teams Shine
May 22, 2023
Watervliet has two seniors who have made a positive impression in the classroom, on the athletic playing fields, and in the community over the past four years – and this spring, they’ve helped their respective teams to back-to-back-to-back baseball and softball league championships.
Tyson Williams and Samantha Dietz have been a great example of scholar-athletes at Watervliet High School over the past four years. Williams will earn his 11th varsity letter this spring, and Dietz will earn her 12th. Both are outstanding students as well; Williams has a 3.98 GPA, while Dietz has a 4.13 as they rank ninth and third, respectively, in their senior class.
Both have been exceptional role models for future Panthers; they both spend many days and hours at the elementary schools having lunch, reading, or just hanging out with the elementary students at recess. Both student-athletes are National Honor Society and student council members.
Their teams have achieved plenty during their four years at Watervliet, including combining on a couple of memorable accomplishments – notably, the baseball and softball teams went a combined 73-1 in league play over the last three seasons, and this winter saw the girls and boys basketball varsities both win 20 games for the first time.
Williams is headed to Hope College in the fall to play football. As the quarterback at Watervliet for four years, He threw for more than 5,000 yards and 52 touchdowns. He also led the team in scoring and rebounds this past basketball season and helped the team to a 20-win season after last year's 19-win campaign. Williams was named first-team all-state by the Basketball Coaches Association of Michigan.
In baseball, the Panthers recently clinched the Southwestern Athletic Conference Lakeshore title for the third-consecutive season, and the team has gone undefeated in league play during his 10th, 11th and 12th-grade seasons (with his freshman season canceled due to COVID-19. As of May 15, Williams had pitched a total of 132 career innings and tallied 188 strikeouts, with a 24-6 record, three saves and a 1.77 ERA.
Dietz will continue at Arizona State University this fall. She was a member of the volleyball team which won two SAC division titles, two District titles, and a Regional championship. during her volleyball career, she tallied 1,433 kills and earned all-state honorable mention as a sophomore and made the first team as a junior and senior. During basketball season, Samantha was a part of a back-to-back-to-back SAC Lakeshore championship teams that finished a combined 25-1 in league play and won the program’s first District title since 2006. Dietz scored 1,279 career points and grabbed 1,009 career rebounds. She earned honorable mention all-state twice, and made the first team once.
In softball, Dietz has been a part of the SAC Lakeshore championship team for three seasons (with her freshman season also canceled due to COVID). She is in the MHSAA record book for stolen bases, with 74 in 2022 and 62 in 2021. Her teams also have won back-to-back District titles.
PHOTOS From left, Samantha Dietz and Tyson Williams. (Photos courtesy of the Watervliet athletic department.)
Whiteford, USA Win Big to Line Up Power-Packed D4 Decider
By
Dean Holzwarth
Special for MHSAA.com
June 17, 2022
EAST LANSING – The Ottawa Lake Whiteford softball team has been an offensive juggernaut this entire postseason.
Not much changed in Friday’s Division 4 Semifinal.
The No. 2-ranked Bobcats registered 13 hits and used a big second inning to blank Mount Pleasant Sacred Heart 10-0 in 5 innings at Secchia Stadium.
Whiteford (40-4) will play reigning champion Unionville-Sebewaing in Saturday’s 5:30 p.m. Division 4 Final. The Patriots shut out Pickford 13-0 in the other Semifinal.
The Bobcats, who have advanced to the Semifinals four times over the last six years, have outscored their last four MHSAA Tournament opponents by a combined 48-0.
“We can score runs in a few different ways, which obviously is a big advantage, and because we’re so fast and aggressive on the bases that does force the issue for a lot of teams,” Whiteford coach Matt VanBrandt said. “When you know we are going to be running, sometimes you hurry too much defensively, and that’s to our advantage.”
Whiteford jumped out to an early 2-0 lead in the first inning. Junior Alyssa VanBrandt’s single to right field turned into an early run after a fielding error by the Irish allowed her to sprint all the way home.
“I did not expect that to happen,” Alyssa VanBrandt said. “He was waving me home and I was like, ‘I hit a grounder, why is he waving me home?’ But that felt amazing.”
Senior Berlynn Keller followed with a solo home run over the centerfield wall.
The Bobcats poured it on in the second inning with seven runs on seven hits to take a commanding 9-0 lead.
The early barrage of runs helped set the tone.
“Anytime you can get ahead of good teams at the end of the season, it can be a real momentum shift,” Matt VanBrandt said. “And it helps our pitcher stay calm. She knows we can typically score, and it gives her a little more confidence.”
Alyssa VanBrandt and Adrianna VanBrandt, along with Karlei Conard and Shaylin Alexander combined for eight hits.
Ambrelle Billau drove in a pair of runs with a single during the decisive second inning. Sophomore pitcher Unity Nelson tossed a two-hitter and fanned 11 in five innings of work.
“Our whole team has confidence in everyone up and down our lineup, and Unity has been amazing,” Alyssa VanBrandt said. “She hasn’t hardly made any mistakes in our games, and she’s done really well when the pressure is on.”
Sacred Heart (27-12) was making its first appearance in the Semifinals since 2012. The loss snapped a nine-game winning streak.
“It’s been a long time since we’ve been here and I wanted them to experience this, so we got what we wanted out of this,” Irish coach Josh Wheaton said. “I would've liked to put up a little better fight, but anyone that was here to see this game saw one of, if not the best team in the state of Michigan. That is some legitimate next-level talent right there, and that's why they are here a lot.”
Unionville-Sebewaing 13, Pickford 0 (5 innings)
The Patriots had no trouble advancing to the Finals for the third straight season behind a powerful offense and stellar pitching.
Senior Laci Harris threw a gem, and the offense supplied plenty of support.
This has been Harris’ first season as lead pitcher after playing third base the past three for the top-ranked Patriots.
“It means a lot to me to finish in a Final like this because this was my first and only season to be our No. 1 pitcher,” Harris said. “I threw a lot of curveballs, and it was my best pitch. They weren’t touching it at all.”
Harris struck out 10 and walked one. Her bid for a no-hitter ended with one out in the bottom of the fifth inning when Finley Hudecek singled.
“Her pitches were working today, and she overpowered them,” USA coach Isaiah Gainforth said. “When her pitches are working good, she’s always going to give us a chance to win.
“This is something as a little girl she’s dreamt of, to be the pitcher that gets her team to the state championship. A senior in the circle is a good thing to have.”
The Patriots have won four of the last six Division 4 championships, including the most recent two in 2019 and 2021.
“You always want to get to the last week of the season and play in the last game, and literally we can say we are playing in the last game,” Gainforth said. “It’s pretty cool. It’s what we’ve worked for and prepared for, and for it to come to fruition is good, but we’re not done yet. We still have one more tough one ahead.”
USA scored runs in each of the first three innings.
The Patriots exploded for six runs in the third inning, with five coming before Pickford could get the first out. Sophomore Gabrielle Crumm slapped a two-run double to the wall to put the Patriots ahead 9-0.
USA added three more runs in the fifth.
Crumm went 3-for-4 with four RBI, while Rylie Betson added two hits and three RBI and Harris helped her cause with two hits and a pair of RBI.
A historic season came to an end for the Panthers (25-15-2), who won the program’s first District title en route to the Semifinals.
“This was an amazing run,” second-year coach Matt Hudecek said. “Districts was our goal, and then after that this was bonus softball. We caught fire in Regionals and were able to get down here.”
PHOTOS (Top) Whiteford’s Shaylin Alexander sprints to first base during her team’s Division 4 Semifinal win Friday. (Middle) USA’s Laci Harris fires a pitch with a Pickford runner on second.