2017 Community Service Awards Honor 6
May 11, 2017
By Geoff Kimmerly
Second Half editor
Students representing six Michigan high schools have been selected as winners of the inaugural Community Service Awards sponsored by the Michigan High School Athletic Association and Lake Trust Credit Union for their efforts to improve the lives of others in their communities.
Brighton senior Bailey Brown, Newaygo senior Justice Ottinger, Ann Arbor Huron junior Katie Sesi, Utica Ford senior Nikki Sorgi, Colon High School’s “Yard Squad” and Rochester Hills Stoney Creek’s Cougar Athletic Leadership Council have earned $1,000 awards to be applied to individual college scholarships, credited to their schools’ athletic departments or gifted to the groups helped by the honorees. In addition to the $1,000 award, the Lake Trust Foundation is awarding an additional $500 to each honoree, to be donated to a non-profit, 501 (c)(3) organization of the awardee’s choice.
The MHSAA and Lake Trust received 70 applications for the first-time awards from schools and students serving communities in both peninsulas and every region of the state. Individual athletes, teams, and other school groups with athletic ties at MHSAA member high schools were eligible for the awards. Nominations were accepted from students, coaches and school administrators.
“We hear all the time about the wonderful contributions athletes are making in their communities by sharing their talents off the field, and it was great to see so many examples of this work all in one place as we selected this first class of honorees,” said MHSAA assistant director Andy Frushour, who oversees brand management and student services for the Association. “We’re glad for the opportunity with Lake Trust to be able to highlight some of this great work being done all over our state.”
One honoree will be profiled daily beginning May 21 on Second Half.
Below are brief summaries of the community services provided by this year’s award winners:
Bailey Brown, Brighton: Diagnosed as a freshman with amplified musculoskeletal pain syndrome, causing nerve pain that eventually resulted in multiple surgeries, Brown dedicated her effort to children hospitalized while undergoing cancer treatment. American Girl offers dolls that do not have hair; Brown endeavored at first to buy two dolls for children whose hair had fallen out during chemotherapy, and instead raised more than $5,000 to purchase 48 dolls and other toys.
Justice Ottinger, Newaygo: Ottinger was the recipient of a donated kidney in June, 2016, and organized the “Ball is Life, Organs Are Too” event to honor his donor, Mark Linsley, and raise awareness of the need for organ donors. Hosting the event during a basketball game, Linsley signed individuals up for organ donation and sold T-shirts he had designed; more than $4,000 was raised for Gift of Life Michigan and 13 donors signed up.
Katie Sesi, Ann Arbor Huron: Earning donations by playing violin at the Ann Arbor Art Fair since she was 6, and collecting more than 300,000 cans and bottles beginning when she was 9, Sesi has raised $40,000 for C.S. Mott Children’s Hospital at the University of Michigan to benefit children with cancer. She has donated $10,000 every two years since 2010, contributing to multiple efforts including the creation of an indoor playground.
Nikki Sorgi, Utica Ford: After first organizing a toy drive for hospitalized children in 2013, Sorgi and her older sister Alex for the last three years have directed a blanket drive designed to provide homemade fleece blankets for patients of any age. Sorgi has helped in providing more than 400 homemade blankets including through Kids Kicking Cancer in Southfield and the C.S. Mott Children’s Hospital.
“Yard Squad,” Colon: Sophomores Andrew Smolarz, Isaiah Fellers and Andy Stoll, and freshmen Phillip Alva and Austin Stoll – members of the track & field team – answered a request for students to help clean up an elderly person’s yard. They’ve since cleaned three yards during weekends and while all five are playing multiple sports during the spring – and with more calls for help coming in as the Squad’s reputation grows.
Cougar Athletic Leadership Council, Rochester Hills Stoney Creek: The Council, a group of student-athletes created to serve the community, produced a Suicide Prevention Awareness event in coordination with a Stoney Creek basketball game Feb. 28. The co-chairpersons of the Council’s Special Events Committee – Isabella Ubaydi, Nate Davis and Kevin Price – planned the event and spoke during halftime on how suicide and mental illness have impacted them and their school community. Funds from T-shirts sold, concessions and additional donations allowed CALC to donate more than $4,700 to the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention.
“Lake Trust Credit Union is proud to partner with MHSAA to recognize and support these hardworking, dedicated community members,” said Lake Trust Credit Union Vice President of Culture + Engagement, Brandalynn Winchester-Middlebrook. “These students exemplify commitment to their teams and neighbors, while making remarkable impacts in our communities.”
Lake Trust Credit Union lives up to their name, with branches that stretch from Lake Michigan to Lake Huron. With over 175,000 members and $1.7 billion in assets, they’re the sixth largest credit union in Michigan. By participating in and supporting over 100 local events, they reach across the state to create stronger communities. Membership is open to anyone who lives, works, worships or attends school in their 35 county service area. Visit www.laketrust.org.
The MHSAA is a private, not-for-profit corporation of voluntary membership by more than 1,400 public and private senior high schools and junior high/middle schools which exists to develop common rules for athletic eligibility and competition. No government funds or tax dollars support the MHSAA, which was the first such association nationally to not accept membership dues or tournament entry fees from schools. Member schools which enforce these rules are permitted to participate in MHSAA tournaments, which attract more than 1.4 million spectators each year.
Record-Setting Coach, Championship Program Leader Selected for 2024 WISL Awards
By
Geoff Kimmerly
MHSAA.com senior editor
January 23, 2024
On the basketball court, no woman in Michigan high school history has led her team to more victories than Bloomfield Hills Marian’s Mary Cicerone. And few schools have stacked more championships over the last decade than Ann Arbor Pioneer under the guidance of athletic director Eve Claar.
To celebrate those accomplishments, and more significantly their impacts on thousands of students over decades in those leadership positions, Cicerone and Claar have been named the 37th and 38th recipients of the Michigan High School Athletic Association’s Women In Sports Leadership Award.
Each year, the Representative Council considers the achievements of women coaches, officials and athletic administrators affiliated with the MHSAA who show exemplary leadership capabilities and positive contributions to athletics. Cicerone and Claar will receive their awards during this year’s WISL Conference, Feb. 4-5 at the Crowne Plaza Lansing West.
Cicerone retired from coaching the Bloomfield Hills Marian girls basketball team after the 2021-22 season with a record of 707-233 since taking over the program in 1983 – making her the fourth-winningest coach in MHSAA girls basketball history, and the winningest woman to lead a program.
She guided the Mustangs to six Finals championships, in Class A in 1988, 1992, 1996 and 1998 and back-to-back in Division 1 in 2014 and 2015. Her teams also won 19 Catholic High School League Central division championships, 20 overall CHSL League titles and reached the MHSAA Semifinals seven times, also finishing Class A runner-up in 1997.
“Mary Cicerone is a legend because she’s won hundreds of games and many championships, and those measurables of her success speak for themselves,” MHSAA Executive Director Mark Uyl said. “But her commitment to her teams, her sport, and leadership in women’s athletics as a whole contributed just as significantly to her tremendous legacy.”
In addition to receiving several local and statewide coaching awards over the years, Cicerone has been inducted into Halls of Fame by the University of Detroit Mercy (2007) as a player and as a coach by the Catholic High School League (1998), Basketball Coaches Association of Michigan (2017) and Marian (2022).
She has served as an officer for the Catholic League Women’s Coaches Association and in 2009 received the CHSL’s Ed Lauer Person of the Year Award.
“Being a young girl wanting to play all kinds of activities, we never had much opportunity and I participated in whatever I was able and just felt like that was something that was important to me, my friends and everybody I was associated with was always part of the same group,” Cicerone said. “I felt like (advocating for women’s sports) was something I should do because it was so important for me, and I appreciated everything everybody did for me and my friends to be able to play.
“It’s not something I needed to do – just something I wanted to do. I stepped into that role, cherished it, worked really hard at it, and hopefully made great memories – for me, for sure – and for others.”
Claar is in her 21st year as an athletic director, and over the last decade has guided one of the state’s largest athletic programs in terms of both programs and student-athletes, with 36 varsity teams and nearly 1,110 participants. The Pioneers have had ample local and statewide success during her tenure, including claiming 16 MHSAA Finals championships across seven sports over the last eight school years (including this one). Most recently, Pioneer tied for most Finals championships among Lower Peninsula schools in 2020-21 with four, were second in 2021-22 with four more, and last school year tied for most in the Lower Peninsula again with three titles.
Claar began in athletic administration as Pioneer’s assistant director from 2003-06, and she became athletic director at Bloomfield Hills Lahser at the start of the 2006-07 school year. She took over the program at Ypsilanti Lincoln as athletic director in 2009 before returning to Pioneer in 2012.
“Eve Claar continues to show the way for her programs to succeed on the field while keeping in mind the big picture of what’s important in school sports,” Uyl said. “She’s invested in providing the best experiences for Pioneer’s student-athletes, and athletes competing throughout the Southeastern Conference, while also providing support to AD colleagues and coaches who look to her for leadership and expertise.”
Claar has served as the Southeastern Conference secretary since 2009 and is the league’s sport director for softball and field hockey. She has been president of the Michigan Field Hockey League since 2018 and has served on several MHSAA sport and site selection committees and as part of the MHSAA/Farm Bureau Insurance Scholar-Athlete Award selection committee. Before becoming an athletic director, Claar worked five years in the Detroit Pistons/Detroit Shock community relations department.
She was named a Regional Athletic Director of the Year in 2019 by the Michigan Interscholastic Athletic Administrators Association (MIAAA). In 2021, she helped found the Southeastern Conference’s Women in Sports Leadership Conference for student-athletes from the league’s 14 schools.
“I started with (longtime Pioneer AD) Lorin Cartwright before me, and she was always a mentor for me. I’ve always had female leaders and mentors whether in sports for high school, over to Pioneer, with the Shock with Nancy Lieberman – I’ve been around amazing female leaders,” Claar said. “I feel at this point, 21 years into doing this, now it’s upon me to do the same. I’ve been honored when I’ve had other athletic directors reach out, other female ADs ask for support, and I’ve been able to give the support that (my mentors) gave me.”
Cicerone is a 1978 graduate of Coopersville High School, where she was a basketball all-stater and ran track, and she then starred on the basketball court at Detroit Mercy, leading the Titans to three Association for Intercollegiate Athletics for Women (AIAW) state titles and graduating as Mercy’s all-time career assists leader while earning a bachelor’s degree in education. She won the 1982 President’s Award as U-D’s most outstanding female student-athlete.
She taught primarily physical education at Marian beginning with the 1983-84 school year through her retirement 39 years later, and also coached track & field for a season at the start of her teaching career.
Claar is a 1991 graduate of North Farmington High School and earned her bachelor’s degree in business administration from Central Michigan University and master’s from Detroit Mercy. She received a teaching certificate from Wayne State University and education leadership certificate from Eastern Michigan University, and earned her certified athletic administrator (CAA) designation in 2008. Claar played basketball, volleyball and softball at North Farmington and was a BCAM Miss Basketball Award finalist in 1990. She continued as a standout at CMU, finishing her playing career in 1995, and remains among the most accomplished 3-point shooters in program history. She also served as a graduate assistant women’s basketball coach at U-D for two seasons.
More than 800 participants – mostly female high school student-athletes from across the state – have registered to attend this year’s sold-out WISL Conference, the 26th in the series that remains the first, largest and longest-running program of its type in the country.
The opening address Feb. 4 will be presented by Cathy George, the all-time winningest volleyball coach in Michigan State University history and the first head coach of the newly-created Grand Rapids Rise professional volleyball franchise. Current MSU volleyball coach Leah Johnson will speak during the morning’s general session Feb. 5 on the conference’s theme “Share the Vision” – she finished her second season leading the Spartans in the fall after coaching Illinois State University from 2017-21 and taking ISU to the NCAA Tournament her last four seasons before leaving for East Lansing.
Several workshops will be offered over the two days, with topics including coaching, teaching and learning leadership; sports nutrition and performance, and empowerment and goal-setting. Presenters are accomplished in their fields and represent a wide range of backgrounds in sport. A complete itinerary is available on the WISL page.
The first Women In Sports Leadership Award was presented in 1990.
Past recipients
1990 – Carol Seavoy, L’Anse
1991 – Diane Laffey, Harper Woods
1992 – Patricia Ashby, Scotts
1993 – Jo Lake, Grosse Pointe
1994 – Brenda Gatlin, Detroit
1995 – Jane Bennett, Ann Arbor
1996 – Cheryl Amos-Helmicki, Huntington Woods
1997 – Delores L. Elswick, Detroit
1998 – Karen S. Leinaar, Delton
1999 – Kathy McGee, Flint
2000 – Pat Richardson, Grass Lake
2001 – Suzanne Martin, East Lansing
2002 – Susan Barthold, Kentwood
2003 – Nancy Clark, Flint
2004 – Kathy Vruggink Westdorp, Grand Rapids
2005 – Barbara Redding, Capac
2006 – Melanie Miller, Lansing
2007 – Jan Sander, Warren Woods
2008 – Jane Bos, Grand Rapids
2009 – Gail Ganakas, Flint; Deb VanKuiken, Holly
2010 – Gina Mazzolini, Lansing
2011 – Ellen Pugh, West Branch; Patti Tibaldi, Traverse City
2012 – Janet Gillette, Comstock Park
2013 – Barbara Beckett, Traverse City
2014 – Teri Reyburn, DeWitt
2015 – Jean LaClair, Bronson
2016 – Betty Wroubel, Pontiac
2017 – Dottie Davis, Ann Arbor
2018 – Meg Seng, Ann Arbor
2019 – Kris Isom, Adrian
2020 – Nikki Norris, East Lansing
2021 – Dorene Ingalls, St. Ignace
2022 – Lori Hyman, Livonia
2023 – Laurie Glass, Leland
PHOTOS Bloomfield Hills Marian coach Mary Cicerone, left, huddles with her team during an MHSAA Finals weekend, and Ann Arbor Pioneer athletic director Eve Claar welcomes John and Jim Harbaugh into the school's Pioneer Hall of Fame. (Claar photo courtesy of Ann Arbor Public Schools.)