Awards Honor Those Lending a Hand
April 12, 2017
By Geoff Kimmerly
Second Half editor
Sports often make up a significant, although singular part of the lives of Michigan’s high school student-athletes and coaches.
Many also find ways to have significant impacts on the lives of others – and we’d like to tell the rest of our state how they’re making a difference.
The Michigan High School Athletic Association, together with Lake Trust Credit Union, will award this spring the inaugural Community Service Awards to recognize individuals and teams that have worked to benefit their communities.
Each winner will receive a $1,000 award to be applied toward an individual college scholarship, credited to a team’s account with its athletic department or even gifted to the group helped by our honoree.
Please help us get the word out. Encourage a student, coach or administrator to tell us about a completed or ongoing community service project. Any student, team or coach currently participating in interscholastic athletics at an MHSAA member high school can apply. Applications should be e-mailed both to the school’s athletic director and MHSAA’s Kurt Tiesman at [email protected].
The deadline for applications is May 1, and multiple winners will be selected and notified by May 12. Click for more information.
We hear and read about these contributions and successes throughout the school year. Thank you in advance for your help in allowing us to honor some of this great work in the community by those who also shine on the field.
PHOTO: Members of the Adrian boys track & field team help clean up after a tornado in Dexter in 2012.
Fall Tournaments to Conclude in January
December 26, 2020
By Geoff Kimmerly
Second Half editor
The concluding rounds of Michigan High School Athletic Association postseason tournaments in football, girls volleyball and girls swimming & diving will be completed during January, as the MHSAA continues to follow all emergency orders from the Michigan Department of Health & Human Services (MDHHS).
Football teams may begin two days of outdoor, non-contact conditioning and drills, wearing helmets and shoulder pads with physical distancing, on Monday, Dec. 28, in advance of the first round of testing Dec. 30 as part of an MDHHS rapid testing pilot program. Schools will test players, coaches and other team personnel, with full-contact practice then allowed after a first round of negative results. The testing program will utilize BinaxNOW antigen tests that produce results within 15 minutes.
For football, 11-Player Regional Finals and 8-Player Semifinals will be played Saturday, Jan. 9. The 8-Player Finals and 11-Player Semifinals will be played Saturday, Jan. 16; and 11-Player Finals will be played during the weekend of Jan. 22-23.
The MDHHS’s current epidemic order – which paused activity beginning Nov. 18 – is set to expire Jan. 15, and if restrictions on non-contact sports are lifted then volleyball and swimming & diving could practice and compete at that time outside of the required rapid testing program. If the MDHHS epidemic order continues, volleyball and swimming & diving could begin practice, but those teams and individuals will have to follow all requirements of the MDHHS rapid testing pilot program to be eligible to participate. Specific plans and dates for volleyball and girls swimming & diving practice resumption and MHSAA tournaments will be finalized and shared with competing schools in early January.
Volleyball competition will restart with Quarterfinals, and Lower Peninsula girls swimming & diving has advanced to its Finals. The championship events in both sports would be completed no later than Jan. 30.