Lessons Learned Keep Paying Off

February 8, 2013

By Terri Finch Hamilton
Reprinted with permission of CMUChippewas.com 

Gina Mazzolini's parents taught her to be a good person first, a good student second, and a good athlete after that. But Mazzolini says her involvement in sports at CMU taught her things that went way beyond the classroom.

"At Central, I learned women are just as good as men -- or better," says Mazzolini, assistant director at the Michigan High School Athletic Association. "I learned that if we put our minds to it, we can do anything."

A star athlete in volleyball and basketball at CMU from 1974 to 1978, Mazzolini says college sports helped her soar after the limitations for girls in high school sports in the early 1970s.

"In high school, women were always taking the back seat to men," says Mazzolini, 57.  "I didn't see women in leadership positions in high school. Girls couldn't use the weight room -- we had to sneak in, then we'd get kicked out. They'd look at me and say, 'Why would you want to lift weights?'

"When the guys were done with the gym, then we could use it."

As an athlete at St. Johns High School, Mazzolini was just starting to compete competitively, she says. She won the school's first ever female athlete of the year award.

"Then I went to Central Michigan, and my teammates were all the best kids from their high school teams. Suddenly, everybody was good. And everybody we played against was good."

It was eye opening, she says.

"You learn a lot about yourself," she says. "If you can survive a practice, if you can survive playing Michigan State, you get confidence. I realized I was good. I learned how to be competitive, in a good way."

In basketball, she led the Chippewas in scoring and rebounding three straight seasons - averaging in double figures in both categories. After graduating from CMU, Mazzolini went on to teach and coach at the high school and college levels. She was inducted into the CMU Athletic Hall of Fame in 1992.

A few years later, Mazzolini received the 2009-10 Women In Sports Leadership Award by the Representative Council of the MHSAA.

So much of what she learned on the college volleyball and basketball courts prepared her for later success, Mazzolini says.

"In athletics, you can't worry about what just  happened," she says. "You control your emotions, you take a deep breath, you move forward."

Good advice on any day, she says.

"You learn that you don't always win, and you learn to take defeat gracefully," she says. "Later, in your business life, you're not going to win everything, either. Sports teaches you how to deal with setbacks, how to work hard and rearrange your goals so that you do better next time.

"You learn if you work together, you can achieve amazing things."

CMUChippewas.com is running a series of stories to celebrate the 40th anniversary of Title IX legislation. Click to see more of the series.

Despite Overall Dip, 8 Sports Add Athletes

July 8, 2015

By Geoff Kimmerly
Second Half editor

Eight high school sports for which postseason tournaments are sponsored by the Michigan High School Athletic Association enjoyed gains in participation during the 2014-15 school year. However, total participation in MHSAA sports decreased slightly for the fourth straight school year, following a continuing trend of declining member school enrollments.

A total of 282,623 participants took part in the 28 tournament sports offered by the MHSAA during the past year – a 1.95-percent decrease from the 2013-14 figure of 288,230. However, enrollments at member schools also decreased 1.24 percent from 2013-14 and have fallen 11.1 percent since the 2006-07 school year – while MHSAA participation has fallen only 9.7 percent during that time. This year’s dip was only slightly larger than the 1.9-percent decrease from 2012-13 to 2013-14.

Overall boys participation fell 1.5 percent from 2013-14 to 2014-15, while girls participation fell 2.6 percent. The overall MHSAA totals count students once for each sport in which they participate, meaning students who are multiple-sport athletes are counted more than once. 

Girls lacrosse was the only MHSAA sport to set a participation record during 2014-15, with 2,589 athletes (an increase of 1.9 percent) this spring, and has set a participation record every season since becoming a sponsored tournament sport in 2005. However, boys lacrosse, which also became tournament sponsored in 2005, saw its first decrease in participation, falling 2.6 percent to 4,958 athletes despite five schools adding programs to bring that total to 130.

Baseball participation increased for the fourth straight school year, this season six tenths of a percent to 18,333 athletes. The other six sports that saw increased participation during 2014-15 all bounced back from decreases between 2012-13 and 2013-14. Boys bowling increased 4.2 percent to 3,724 athletes, its second-highest total as an MHSAA tournament sport. Both boys skiing (4.0 percent increase to 775 athletes) and girls skiing (1.4 percent to 671) also saw higher participation after two seasons of declines. Girls competitive cheer (1.0 percent to 7,189 athletes), girls gymnastics (3.0 percent to 618) and boys soccer (1.0 percent to 14,426) also saw bounce-back years after dips the school year before.

However, two of the most popular girls sports continued to experience downward trends. Girls basketball participation fell for the ninth straight season, to 15,702 athletes, the sport’s lowest total since records first were kept in 1991-92. The girls basketball total has decreased 18 percent since a U.S. District Court decision led to the switching of girls basketball season from fall to winter beginning in 2007-08. Comparatively, girls enrollment at MHSAA schools during that time has fallen 11.6 percent.

The sport that swapped seasons with girls basketball and moved to fall, volleyball, saw a 3.3-percent drop in participation this school year to 17,996 athletes, its fewest since 1991-92 and a decrease of 16.5 percent since its final season as a winter sport.

Also of note in this year’s survey:

  • Total, eight sports saw increases in participation in 2014-15 (four boys, four girls), while 20 experienced decreases (10 boys, 10 girls).

  • A recent drop in football participation, 11 and 8-player teams combined, has continued to slow, the total this season falling only 1.4 percent to 40,088 athletes. The drop from 2011-12 to 2012-13 was 3.7 percent, and the drop from 2012-13 to 2013-14 was two percent.

  • Wrestling saw a decrease for the sixth straight year, this season to 9,475 participants, a 7.9-percent drop from 2013-14 with its lowest total since the collection of data began.

  • Girls cross country, after five straight years of increases, fell back 4.1 percent, to 8,350 athletes, although that total still represented the third highest of the last seven seasons. The trend was identical for boys cross country, except this season’s total of 8,786 athletes was down only 1.1 percent from a year ago and the second-highest over the seven-season string.

  • Swimming and diving saw the largest decrease among a pair of related sports; girls participation fell six percent to 4,938 athletes and boys fell 7.4 percent to 5,617 after both had experienced slight increases during the last three school years.

  • Boys golf participation fell for the sixth straight season, to 6,533 athletes, its lowest since 1991-92.

The participation figures are gathered annually from MHSAA member schools to submit to the National Federation of State High School Associations for compiling of its national participation survey. Results of Michigan surveys from the 2000-01 school year to present may be viewed on the MHSAA Website – www.mhsaa.com – by clicking on Schools > Administrators > Sports Participation Listing.

The following chart shows participation figures for the 2014-15 school year from MHSAA member schools for sports in which the Association sponsors a postseason tournament:

                BOYS                                                   GIRLS

SPORT

SCHOOLS  (A)

PARTICIPANTS

SCHOOLS (A)

PARTICIPANTS (B)

Baseball

639/650/6

18,325

-

-/8

Basketball

726/733/5

21,401

665/726

15,702/14

Bowling

355/371/9

3,711

339/366

2,970/13

Competitive Cheer

-

-

335/348

7,189

Cross Country

605/639/0

8,786

587/637

8,350/0

Football –

                11 player

597/621/59

39,338

-

-/65

                  8-player

33/38/0

685

-

-

Golf

503/532/46

6,460

325/331

3,334/73

Gymnastics

-

-

66/75

618

Ice Hockey

232/269/11

3,448

-

-/15

Lacrosse

130/137/3

4,955

88/91

2,589/3

Skiing

87/100/0

775

90/98

671/0

Soccer

466/495/16

14,370

459/479

13,333/56

Softball

-

-

570/635

13,113

Swimming & Diving

233/264/3

4,935

256/275

5,617/3

Tennis

299/316/6

6,294

335/345

8,628/11

Track & Field

661/684/0

22,439

645/681

16,855/0

Volleyball