Unexpected Ubly Reaches Season Finale
June 14, 2013
By Bill Khan
Special to Second Half
BATTLE CREEK — Nobody outside of Ubly expected the Bearcats to be playing for the MHSAA Division 4 softball championship.
Even some within the inner circle were skeptical.
"It's crazy and unbelievable," senior catcher Alyssa Briolat said following an 8-6 victory over Grosse Pointe Woods University Liggett in a Semifinal on Friday at Bailey Park. "I would never have thought this would happen. It's just so surreal. I'm on cloud nine and my feet haven't touched the ground yet since we've been here. Now that we're going to the Final, we just need to keep it up and play our game."
It's understandable that Ubly's trip to the Final has caught everyone by surprise. The Bearcats (27-6) had never won a Regional championship until this season and were unranked. Even as they marched all the way to Battle Creek, they did so without facing a team that even merited honorable mention in the final state rankings.
But against a fourth-ranked Liggett team that allowed two runs or fewer in 26 of its 31 games, Ubly became the first team this season to put up eight runs against the Knights (27-5).
"At the beginning of the season, regionals was our goal," Ubly coach Courtney Dekoski said. "Last year we lost in the first round of regionals, so our goal was to improve there. Look where we are."
The Bearcats are playing on the final day of the season against top-ranked Kalamazoo Christian at 12:30 p.m. Saturday at Bailey Park. After toppling the fourth-ranked team in the state, the Bearcats won't be intimidated against a program that owns six MHSAA titles.
"I'm psyched," Dekoski said. "There's no stopping us now with the momentum we have and the girls we have. It's anybody's game."
The key to Ubly's victory was a four-run third inning that featured a two-run homer by Briolat.
"I definitely wasn't trying for a home run," Briolat said. "I just wanted to get a hit. I struggled a little in the quarterfinal and I struck out my first at bat. I just wanted to make some contact. Right from the bat, it felt good."
The home run gave Ubly a 4-1 lead. Liggett scored twice in the bottom of the third inning to make it 4-3, but the Knights could never catch up. A three-run fifth got Liggett within 7-6, but Ubly got breathing room when Maria Guza led off the seventh with a home run.
Julia DeRoo gave Liggett a chance by leading off the seventh with a single, but she was picked off when pitcher Michela Guza speared a line drive by Emily Kanakry and threw to first base to complete a rally-killing double play.
"I was paying attention and knew if I caught it, I saw her off the base and we might have a double play," Guza said.
Maria Guza and Briolat drove in three runs each for Ubly.
Kalamazoo Christian 2, Rogers City 0
Senior Stephanie VanderLugt pitched a two-hit shutout for Kalamazoo Christian. She struck out nine and allowed only one run.
Rogers City's only significant threat came in the top of the seventh inning, when it put runners on first and second with one out. VanderLugt forced two popups to second base to end the game.
"I was a little nervous, because they could win with a home run, and I knew they had quite a few home runs over the whole year," VanderLugt said. "I was just trying to focus on my game, rather than what their batters had."
VanderLugt got all the support she would need when freshman Kara Gjeltema hit a solo homer to right field with one out in the fourth inning. The Comets got an insurance run when Carly Vandenberg led off the fifth with a double and scored on an error.
Kalamazoo Christian has won eight straight games, outscoring its competition 67-8, since getting swept 11-0, 15-5 late in the season by Division 1 powerhouse Mattawan.
"We don't see a Division 4 team until we get to this," Kalamazoo Christian coach Karla Reno said. "Locally, we've got Portage Central, Portage Northern, Mattawan, Coloma, Wayland, who are really top teams. All of the KVA teams are bigger schools than us. It helps prepare us tremendously. You can never play good teams too much. It helps bring our level of play up."
Rogers City (33-7) was in the semifinals for the first time since 2004, scoring 77 runs in six postseason games before getting blanked.
"We ran into a really good pitcher today," Rogers City coach Karl Grambau said. "We just couldn't come up with the big hit. We hit the ball all year. We're a great hitting team. You've got to give the Kalamazoo Christian pitcher a lot of credit."
Kalamazoo Christian is in the MHSAA Final for the ninth time, but the first time since 2002. The Comets have won the last six times they've reached the title game.
PHOTOS: (Top) Ubly first baseman Lindsey Briolat prepares to scoop up a grounder during Friday's Semifinal win over University Liggett. (Middle) Kalamazoo Christian pitcher Stephanie VanderLugt delivers during her shutout of Rogers City. (Click to see more from Hockey Weekly Action Photos.)
Grandville, Dakota Follow Veterans' Leads
June 15, 2017
By Geoff Kimmerly
Second Half editor
EAST LANSING – A powder puff football game was not going to keep the Grandville softball team from making history this season.
Ellie Muilenburg made sure of that. The Bulldogs had big plans, but needed her to keep them.
Sporting a white head band, maroon hair bow and black plastic brace on her left knee, Muilenburg took the pitcher’s circle for Grandville’s first MHSAA Semifinal since 1982.
Less than a year after tearing a knee ligament, seven months after surgery to repair it and about 30 games after she returned to the circle, the Bulldogs’ senior ace allowed two hits and struck out nine in a 2-1 win over Clarkston at Secchia Stadium.
On Saturday, Grandville will play for its first MHSAA softball title.
“After my ACL injury, I thought it was going to be a really tough battle coming back, and it was. But I’ve come back stronger than I’ve played my whole career,” Muilenburg said.
“It was mentally, emotionally, physically draining. But I knew I could do it for my team. We’ve been saying since day one this was the state championship team. We knew we could make it.”
The Bulldogs (32-7), an honorable mention in the final regular-season poll, will face top-ranked Macomb Dakota (35-2) at 12:30 p.m. Saturday.
Muilenburg also helped pitch Grandville to league and District titles last season and is a four-year varsity player. But she suffered a knee injury during a powder puff football game in the fall and had surgery just five months before her softball team’s first games of this spring.
“There were times when she’d go, ‘I’ll be back,’ and I’d go, we’ll see,” Grandville coach Troy Ungrey said. “Ten games in she said, ‘I’m testing it out next week.’ When she said she was ready to go, of course I said, ‘Yes!’”
Muilenburg did indeed return for the team’s 11th game, a 14-3 win over Holland West Ottawa where Ungrey noticed “she had a smile on her face like the first game she threw for us” freshman year.
With Thursday’s win, Muilenberg moved to 17-1 since her return. But a young Clarkston team nearly put Grandville’s good times to an end.
With only one senior on the roster, the Wolves (32-10) – also a rankings honorable mention – matched zeroes with the Bulldogs through five innings. Grandville scored its runs in the top of the sixth, both on errors. Clarkston came back in the bottom of the inning and loaded the bases, scoring on freshman Sierra Kersten’s sacrifice fly with two outs – but Muilenburg came back to get a swinging strikeout to end the rally. She also got the final out on strikes before being engulfed by her teammates.
“As a pitcher, it’s really a mental game. And so mentally, I just have to think I’m better than you – I’m going to get this; this is my game,” Muilenburg said. “And so I just turn around and throw how I do.”
She struck out nine and gave up only two hits, while Clarkston sophomore Olivia Warrington didn’t yield an earned run and struck out six while allowing four hits.
Macomb Dakota 6, Mattawan 3
Dakota was in a similar spot as Grandville last season, making a championship game for the first time before falling to Farmington Hills Mercy in the Final.
It’s been tough for the Cougars this spring to not look ahead to mid-June. But putting up four runs in the first inning Thursday provided a deserved reward for their self-discipline leading up to that point.
“All year, it’s been come back here, do work and stay focused,” Dakota junior centerfielder Olivia Patton said. “Each game, we knew that each inning counted and everything matters … (but) we knew that we wanted to come back here all season.”
Patton had one of the hits and scored the second run of that first-inning rally, which included senior first baseman Julia Salisbury driving in one, senior pitcher Kendahl Dunford doubling home two and sophomore catcher Sam DiCicco knocking in the fourth.
For the game, Patton, junior shortstop Corbin Hison and senior leftfielder Kattie Popko all had two hits. Patton’s second was a triple.
Fifth-ranked Mattawan (32-8) did get to Dunford for one run in the first inning and two in the third. But she retired the final 12 batters in order, giving herself and a number of contributors from last season another chance to win the program’s first title.
“The first time we were here was very nerve-wracking, and obviously it still is,” Patton said. “But knowing we can do it, and staying positive, is very helpful.”
Mattawan junior pitcher Emily Koperdak also had two hits and scored twice. Senior third baseman Joanna Bartz drove in two runs.
PHOTOS: (Top) Grandville's Ellie Muilenburg unloads a pitch during Thursday's first Division 1 Semifinal. (Middle) Dakota's Lauren Bobowski rounds third base on the way to scoring one of her team's six runs.