Seeking assistance in picking out entries for SPJ contest

 With the end of the calendar year, and the start of the new one come the yearly contests, and while I didn't write a lot last year (read: enough), I still had a few stories that were worthwhile. Below are seven stories I liked. I need to pare that down to three for the Society of Professional Journalists contest. Reply on social media with the three you like best.

GIRLS BASKETBALL: Big-game hunting West Bloomfield Lakers rally from double-digit semifinal deficit to beat Rockford in OT

EAST LANSING — If you’re going to go big-game hunting, at some point, you’re gonna have to take ‘the shot.’ 

For the No. 1-ranked West Bloomfield Lakers, the shot that allowed them to take down the big game they’d been hunting all season — No. 2 Rockford, the defending champs — came off the hands of Indya Davis, who nailed a 3-pointer as time expired in regulation to send Friday’s Division 1 semifinals to overtime.

The Lakers outscored the Rams, 10-2 in overtime, completing their comeback from as many as 13 points down in the third, rolling on to win, 55-47, to send themselves back to the title game for the third time in as many seasons.

“Our theme this season was ‘Big Game Hunting.’ That’s why you see us with all the camouflage,” said Lakers coach Darrin McAlister. “Today, we were hunting some Rams. Tomorrow (Saturday), we’ll be hunting Bobcats.”

West Bloomfield (26-1) will take on Grand Blanc (23-4) for the D1 title at 12:15 Saturday in MSU’s Breslin Center, looking to capture their second title in three seasons. 

It was Rockford (26-2) that was the last Michigan team to beat the Lakers in last year’s finals, a motivation all year long for the Lakers, part of the reason they’d scheduled a handful of tough non-conference games, including the game against Toledo Antyony Wayne — the closest McAllister could find to a Rockford — that cost the Lakers their only loss this season.

“Losing to Rockford last year was unacceptable,” said Indya Davis, “so we came back with a new fire this year, and beat them.”

That 40-36 loss to the Rams a season ago — a game in which the Lakers led with 1:45 left — had been the motivation for the season, but so was getting back to the title game, regardless of who they had to go through. Rockford was just a bonus.

“It took us 365 days, and an extra quarter to get it back, but we felt like we left something in East Lansing a year ago,” McAllister said. “This was just us getting back what we left behind.”

After the game was tied at 17-17, the Rams used a 12-0 run to stretch out to a 29-17 lead just before the half. 

A Summer Davis 3-pointer sent the Lakers into the break down 29-20, and McAllister reminded the Lakers that they’d trailed the Rams in the 2022 semifinal, when they came back to win.

Rockford got the lead back up to 13 points, at 35-22, on a layup by Anna Wypych with 3:51 left in the third, but that was the high-water mark, as the Lakers would outscore the Rams 33-12 the rest of the way.

It started with an 11-4 run to close out the third, leaving the Lakers down just 39-33 entering the fourth, and three minutes into the final period, West Bloomfield had it tied ups at 39-39 on a jumper by Indya Davis. 

The Lakers had to play the final 10 minutes of the game without point guard Destiny Washington, who picked up three quick fouls in the fourth guarding Wypych, and fouled out with 5:56 to go, forcing Summer Davis to slide over to the point. 

A Grace Lyons layup with 1:49 put Rockford back up 42-39, then two free throws by Jordan Mateer with six seconds left, re-established the three-point lead, 45-42.

But they’d left enough time to set up a shot for the Lakers, and Indya Davis wanted it.

“I told Summer I wanted the shot. I knew as soon as it left my hand it was good,” Indya Davis said. “That’s the type of shot you see in moves, but you don’t think it’s gonna go in.”

Her twin sister had no doubt, nor did her coach, who’d put his team through end-of-game drills relentlessly throughout the season.

“I believed in her,” Summer Davis said.

Neither team scored for nearly half the overtime session, but Wypych split at the line with 2:24 left, putting Rockford up 46-45 — and up for the last time, as it turned out.

Summer Davis, who was 13-for-16 from the free-throw line for the game, drew a foul on Wypych with 1:28 left — fouling out the Rockford star — and hit two free throws to put West Bloomfield ahead for good at 47-46, then nailed nine more free throws to close out the Lakers’ scoring. 

Summer Davis finished with 22 points and four assists, while Indya Davis had 17 points and seven rebounds. Both players have won the Gatorade Michigan girls basketball Player of the Year honors — Indya last year, Summer this — but both were shut out of honors in the Miss Basketball voting. The award went to Holland West Ottawa’s Gabby Reynolds.

“I know some of you here voted, but I feel like some of you got it wrong. These players are the real deal,” McAllister said.

The Lakers have one more step to reclaim their title, though, facing a Grand Blanc team they’ve seen before: West Bloomfield beat Grand Blanc, 67-28, in the regular-season finale for both squads.

The Bobcats scored 14 of the game’s final 17 points in the earlier semifinal to beat Belleville, 54-45, and advance to the title game for the first time ever.

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GIRLS BASKETBALL: Elia Morgner’s last-second bucket lifts Clarkston past Lake Orion, to district title

WATERFORD — Elia Morgner isn’t sure if she was more nervous just before tipoff or just before the final buzzer of Friday’s Division 1 district championship game. 

Regardless, hitting the bucket the second time felt oh, so much better.

Clarkston’s junior forward hit a layup with 1.4 seconds left in the game, giving the Wolves just their second lead of the game — and the most important one, the final one — as they held on to beat rival Lake Orion, 41-40. 

“I think it might have been (more nervous) on that last shot. I gotta be honest. I think my eyes were closed,” the junior laughed. “I've never been so nervous.”

She was a little nervous before the game, too, when — just before tipoff — she sprinted toward one of the exits from Waterford Mott’s gymnasium, dragging a waste receptacle out in the hallway, so she could rid herself of the products of her nervous stomach. 

“It was really hot in the locker room, and I'm always a little nervous — I get super nervous before my games. And I just kinda … it was a lot,” she admitted with a grin. 

A lot of that comes with the territory of playing your arch-rival in a pressure packed game like a district final, and Morgner wasn’t the only member of the Wolves (18-6) who looked nervous at the start. 

Lake Orion (15-9) built a 12-4 lead after one quarter, and took advantage of the nervous Wolves’ inability to convert on shots or free throws — 4-for-13 in the first half — to expand it to 20-13 at the break, then to 25-13 early in the third quarter.

“Before the game I told the girls defense travels and that's what we do. So, at any point we can get it back. We knew we could turn the pressure up a little bit too, but the defense was always going to be there,” Clarkston coach Aaron Goodnough said. “We didn't play bad defense in the first half. We just gave up a couple easy buckets and our first fouls to get them on the free-throw line early were — they were nervous fouls. That's the only way I can define them. They were nervous fouls. They were that ‘wave at foul, going by' and so we deserved every one of them. And we knew we couldn't beat him if they we put them on the line, because Izzy (Wotlinski) can really shoot from the line and they can as a team so we knew we couldn't do that all night.”

It took a 9-0 run to get the Wolves right back in it, trimming the deficit to 25-22 with 3:57 left in the third, and from there on out, the rest of the way, it was a nip-and-tuck game.

The Dragons led 30-26 headed to the fourth, but a Morgner layup got it within one, 36-35, with 3:51 left. Lake Orion had the ball with a 38-37 lead with 1:23 left, but Clarkston forced a jump ball with 52.1 seconds remaining, and got a driving bucket from Elli Robak with 22 seconds left, putting the Wolves ahead for the first time all game, 39-38. 

Ryan Pawlaczyk scored with 17 seconds left to put the Dragons back in front, 40-39, but the Wolves called timeout with 6.2 seconds left to draw up a play.

Goodnough gave his point guard, Brooklyn Covert, two options — to get a 3-point chance for Robak, or a bucket down low for Morgner — and the second materialized. 

“It wasn't necessarily designed to be a last bucket, right? But we knew we didn't need a 3. It's run for a 3 or a 2. And they covered the 3 and we got the 2. So I mean, I think we led maybe twice. We lead maybe twice the whole game by a point. And that's about how we played. I mean, it's we we just came out so flat. I don't know if that was the Lake Orion-Clarkston thing. I'm sure it was, to some extent,” Goodnough said. “We just kept plugging away and we turned up the pressure. That was it. We didn't necessarily want to do it in the first half. But we knew in the second half, we could turn up the pressure and they’d give it up here and there.”

On the final play, Covert drew the defense to her, and passed it off to Morgner for the game-winner.

“I wasn't sure if it was coming to me or not. We were trying to get a layup. But I mean, if Elli had an open 3, she's a great shooter, she would shoot it,” Morgner said. “Brooklyn’s really good at attacking, and she just made such a smart decision to pass it to me, she had the layup and mine was more open. And I'm so proud of both them. And I think it was a good decision.”

The Dragons got a timeout before the clock rolled to zeroes, but with only 1.4 seconds left, the best they could hope for was a catch and heave, and it missed, leaving the Wolves as district champions. 

“Last year, we lost to them in the district finals. And I mean, we were both completely different teams. And we were in one and one with them in the regular season. So there was a lot of tension coming to this game. And I mean, I played with some of the girls at Orion for a long time. And I love all of them,” Morgner said. “And I just it was it was a lot, but I think I'm very proud of my team and that we were able to pull it together after a rough first half.”

Robak finished with 12 points, while Morgner had 11 and Covert eight. Pawlaczyk had 14 points to lead all scorers, while Wotlinski had 13 points, and Nevaeh Wood had five points and 10 rebounds. 

“They played their hearts out. We played our hearts out. They just made one more shot that we did,” Lake Orion coach Bob Brydges said. “You know what? I'm proud of my kids. I lost nine seniors last year. … We were talking about it, we have one kid that has played in a district game coming into this series  — one, OK? And only one has ever won a district off of this team. So we're excited about you know, getting to the summer now putting in the works being right back here next year. … Congratulations to those guys. You know, best of luck to them in regionals. Do I wish it was us? Of course. Anytime. But you know this one hurts tonight, we’ll get up tomorrow, get back in the gym and go to work.”

The Wolves head to regionals at Milford on Monday, where they’ll face Lakeland in the second regional semifinal of the night. Grand Blanc and Howell face off in the first semifinal at 5:30 p.m.

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GIRLS BASKETBALL >> Building it the right way: Royal Oak’s Brian Sopata honored for 200th win, having built solid program from scratch

ROYAL OAK — There’s no accurate count on how many batches of brownies were prepared in preparation for Royal Oak girls basketball coach Brian Sopata’s impending milestone win, since figuring out which day it was going to come was a challenge.

Once he got to 199 a few weeks ago, it was no secret that No. 200 was coming, but the only problem was timing — specifically the lack of cooperation from the weather that canceled two of the Ravens’ cracks at the milestone. 

Then there was a near-miss, a two-point Monday loss to league rival Birmingham Seaholm on a night when the weather threatened more cancellations, before the Ravens got it done with a low-scoring, 26-21 win over Rochester one night later, on Jan. 23.

“I do not know how many brownies were made. I do know that there was (joking) at one point when when our game was canceled again … they said, ‘199 for life.’ I said, ‘Hey, at some point, we're gonna get to play another game,’” Sopata laughed. “The part with coaching kids, just to see how happy they were. Like that celebration was was just, you know, kind of caught me off guard, but it was just fun. I was happy for them. They were as happy as I was. I know we had brownies on Monday, we didn’t have brownies on Tuesday, but we certainly we certainly celebrated.”

While the fact that there would be some hoopla wasn’t lost on Sopata, the volume of responses he got afterward were eye-opening. 

“You sometimes see these stoic coaches that are like, ‘I’ll evaluate it after,’ but when you have parents pull out a sign that your players have made that covers up half a wall in the gym, and your kids are excited for you, and they're cheering you on …,” Sopata said. “I sometimes get emotional, but it kind of hit me. I had family there at Monday night. And that family had again on Tuesday. And it was just nice to do it in front of them as well.”

And he certainly didn’t expect what happened last week, when he was named the BCAM/Pistons coach of the week, the nomination coming from a coaching peer, Plymouth’s Ryan Ballard. 

“Absolutely surprised me,” Sopata admitted. “The part that's really humbling is when your colleagues, your current bosses or your former ADs are reaching out and just thanking you for what you do. It's nice to be recognized. Again, we don't — we don't coach for that. But it's just yeah, it was — it was awesome. And again, I have these wonderful parents that come to every game and sit the stands. So to be able to show that to them, it was pretty cool.”

Many of the well-wishers on social media mentioned the fact that Sopata’s success came by ‘doing it the right way.’ That recognition means as much as anything for him, as does doing it in his hometown, where he’s lived his entire life.

“I was mentored by Paul Galbenski, who literally instilled in me how we're going to do things, and we're gonna look in the mirror at the end of the day and (say) ‘We can be proud of what we're doing for kids.’ There are times that the job itself is never easy. And there's times — especially when it comes to playing times and minutes, and tough conversations with kids and all of those things — but you know, at the end of the day, what you're doing is helping them down the road. They may not see it, their parents might not see it immediately. We're going to we're going to do things in a way that's going to help you well beyond a basketball court. And that part is huge,” Sopata said. 

“And then I love the fact that every single kid basically that comes through our programs, was a Royal Oak middle school kid who's been here and lived here. And so it's fun to coach the kids in your community. I mean, most of these kids I have known since they started coming to camp when they were third, fourth fifth graders. So yeah, those things. But just integrity. We're gonna do the right things as much as we possibly can. And then the other part — we do make mistakes and owning those, and letting parents know that and players know that because those hurt you learn from those as much as the things you do right.”

Sopata is the dean of Oakland Activities Association girls basketball coaches, in his 18th year coaching the Ravens. 

When he took over the program, it was struggling in the lowest rung of the OAA — the Blue Division at the time — but he’s steadily pushed it up to the White and then finally the Red for a few years, before dropping back down to the White. 

They’re consistently competitive, though, and nobody can take them for granted — like maybe they did at the start.

“It hasn't been easy. … It didn't start off,where you ever thought like, this is maybe where we could get this program,” he said. “We’ll never forget, we won two games that first year, and we had eight times, I think, we had a running clock put on us — and we were just trying to trying to build something we can be proud of and kept working. You know, and like he had like examples of like Tim Carruthers, at North Farmington, who he started, at one point in the lower levels, and just kept working. And he took a team to stay final. Not to say that’s where we're headed. But it's nice to have kept working to a point where, you know, I think we're consistently fielding a quality team, and we're going to be competitive.”

Just outside the Royal Oak gym is a wall containing a photo gallery honoring the school’s ‘coaches of distinction.’ It means something to Sopata that his picture is going to end up there, too. He may go up there at the same time as the school’s boys track and cross country coach, Dave Barnett, a high school classmate and college roommate of Sopata’s, who’s been coaching just as long. 

“We've kind of jokingly talked about someday going up on that wall together. And and yeah, I mean, it's a nice, again, you try to, you know, honoring what coaches do, and the amount of time (it takes). Somebody mentioned how many hours go into winning basketball games. And I can't even calculate — it takes it takes a lot of time, it takes you away from other things. So those little recognitions are nice.”

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SOFTBALL: Ava Bradshaw cherishing every moment of final ride with South Lyon

SOUTH LYON — Like most seniors, the number of school days remaining in the high school years for Ava Bradshaw can be constrained to a single calendar page, or a little more. 

And there’s no place she’s rather spend those final weeks as a high school student, than on a ball diamond, with her friends, slinging straight gas — and notching the no-hitters that sometimes go with it — as she takes one last ride in a South Lyon softball uniform.

Bradshaw soaked up every moment of Thursday’s final regular-season trip across town, to face the rival South Lyon East Cougars, striking out 25 batters over 11 innings of work in the doubleheader, including a seven-inning no-hitter in the opener, as the Lions won, 8-1 and 10-0 in five innings.

“I definitely didn't take it for granted, necessarily, but every time we play, every time I get to just be at practice, I'm enjoying it and I'm soaking it up. And I think another big part of it is my last year of high school as well. So there's a lot of ‘lasts’ happening at the same time,” said the senior, who first burst onto the high school scene as a freshman, leading the Lions to their first-ever state title in 2021. “But again, like just living in the moment and being present. And even though I'm going to play in college, it's never going to be this way again.”

That cherish-every-moment feeling is there for a lot of seniors, but doubly so for one like Bradshaw, who had to miss her entire junior season with a knee injury. While the rest of the Lions had to grow through that process of living without their star pitcher, so did she, learning to live without softball. 

“It was hard for sure. I think the biggest difficulty was, it's like you have the high school season is almost the best time of year — you're playing with all your friends. It's just so much fun. School is coming to an end, it's warm out and … that time of year I look forward to all the time was just like gone. And like all my friends that it would have been my last season with, I just missed out on. And it was really easy for a while to just kind of like sit in that like self pity and like, ‘Oh, poor me’ mentality, but, coming out of it. I'm like, that was the best thing for me,” Bradshaw said. “Because I had to just cheer them on and watch the game from their perspective, and also just learn a lot about myself. Going through rehab, that was a lot that was very hard, you know, like just having to do a lot of things that I don't normally do. As far as like training and workouts, I became a more well-rounded athlete just moving out of that. But like, emotionally, it was definitely hard. But like, nothing doesn't happen (without) a reason, you know.”

So far, the last ride has been going well, with the Lions leaving Thursday’s game with a 12-1 record, 8-0 in the Lakes Valley Conference. Bradshaw is 10-1 with an ERA of 0.45, a WHIP (walks-hits-innings pitched) of 0.54 and a ridiculous strikeout-to-walk ratio that is hovering around 10-to-1, with 133 strikeouts and 14 walks. 

“She's pretty dialed in anyway. I can tell you she's more mature — but we all are two years later, when we're 17. She appears to be having fun — which I'm not saying she didn't in the past. But there's a lot of pressure on you when you win a state championship, and then you come back your sophomore year, and you feel like you got to do it again. So, I feel like she's having fun. I don't feel like she's pressing,” South Lyon coach David Langlois said. “She's a player that, you know, understands her teammates are not perfect. She goes with it. And what is really nice right now is to watch as she's kind of going through it and calling her own pitches and doing things, that there's some just trial and error things. She's working through it adjusting and coming out the other end pretty good. There’s just maturity across the board.”

It helps, too, that the Lions are loaded yet again, with a lot of those players that grew up fast a year ago — and were one of the few to score on the eventual state champion Hartland Eagles in their regional semifinal — growing up at a rapid pace around her, solidifying into a contender.

“Hannah Slevin, one of our catchers, sophomore, the game has sort of slowed down for her. Mady Firstenau, the other catcher — they’re kind of dialed in. The moments aren't so big anymore,” Langlois said. And certainly Ella Glowacki at third base, a sophomore wh gets a lot of reps. The game is slowing down for her right now. No moments to being at the plate.”

Glowacki and Olivia Simeone both drove in two runs with a pair of singles, while Isabella Bracali had a double and two RBI in the opener, as the Lions took a 3-0 lead in the third, added a run in the fourth, then doubled that lead with a four-run fifth.

The Cougars scratched across their lone run of the afternoon when Anna Lassan led off the seventh with a walk, moving around to score on a wild pitch and two passed balls. 

It was the fourth time this season Bradshaw has left the pitching circle having not allowed a single hit — two of them mercy-rule shortened league games, where she went four perfect innings, the other a mercy-rule win over Divine Child in Saturday’s home quad.

The nightcap was much the same, with Bradshaw and (No. 27) dueling, resulting in a 1-0 game into the fifth inning, when the Lions broke it open with a nine spot. Isabella Nooe was 3-for-4 with four RBI, while Glowacki doubled and scored another run. 

Bradshaw wiggled out of a bases-loaded jam in the first, and cruised from there on, striking out nine in four scoreless innings, her eighth start where she hasn’t allowed a run. 

“Bottom line is we're getting better. I can see it. And I, you know, I think you saw it too. I mean, it was it was 1-0 through four. And then the wheels kind of fell off with errors and missed throws and other things. And then the pitcher gets, you know, thinking ‘I have to strike everybody out now.’ So yeah, it just snowballs after that,” East coach Todd Brigmon said. “But the heart was there, the effort was there. And for a young team, as young a team as I have, it was pretty impressive.”

The Lions will continue to test themselves with a home date Saturday against No. 10-ranked Macomb Dakota, as they prep for what they hope to be another deep run in the postseason.

And Bradshaw will continue to cherish every moment.

“When I was out and when I was hurt … I remember I was reminded of how fun it was because I wasn't in it. So coming back, I still have all these feelings of gratitude and stuff, but I'm just very invested in like living in the moment and like leaving a mark on the girls around me — especially the freshmen that I'm only getting one year with,” Bradshaw said. “I want them to not just look up to me in a way but like see like see me as an example of not just a player but a person as well because they see me at school.”

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BASEBALL: South Lyon Lions weather multiple storms to earn a hard-fought pre-district win over Howell

HOWELL — You want everyone to know that it was earned and not given.

The South Lyon Lions understood they were technically, by rule, in line for a weather-shortened win by holding a 3-2 lead at the completion of five innings in Tuesday’s rain-soaked Division 1 baseball pre-district game at Howell, but they certainly didn’t want anyone to think anything had been handed them.

So when the skies cleared a bit, and the host Highlanders pushed to finish the final two innings of the one-run contest after a lightning delay of 77 minutes, the Lions certainly understood the rationale.

They just went out and weathered the storm again — this time in the form of a two-on, two-out jam in the top of the sixth — as Chris Mathis walked the wire to close out the complete-game, 3-2 victory, sending the Lions on to Saturday.

“We got out of that sixth inning, I knew we had to game the hand. I mean, these boys were fired up. It was a tough hour delay to come out and just go right into the conditions. So hats off to Chris Mathis. He came out there shut the door. And we did what we needed to do. That’s a great team, a well-coached team — they battled and we had to earn that win, that's for sure,” said South Lyon coach Erich Stephenson. 

“I know our guys would have left kinda without feeling the satisfaction of beating them. Now we can leave and know that we earned our win and we beat them, you know, fair and square. We played all seven, you know, we dealt with the conditions. I told them that’s a tough team to beat, a tough win for us. So if we can just keep it going, hopefully that's just step one in a long journey for us.”

Adding one more to their school-record win total, the Lions (28-9) advance to Saturday’s district semifinals at Hartland, facing Milford at 10 a.m. Brighton beat Hartland, 4-2, in the other pre-district game Tuesday, and will take on South Lyon East in Saturday’s second district semifinal at 1 p.m.

For the Lakes Valley Conference champion Lions, who were ranked at No. 19 in the Michigan High School Baseball Coaches Association D1 poll for three straight weeks earlier this month, the last thing they wanted to happen to one of the best seasons in years was to have it come to a crashing halt this early in the postseason.

“No,” said Mathis. “We're ready to go. We're ready to make a run.”

Stephenson admitted he’d been nervous of the potentials for an abrupt end Monday night. 

But being in the building at the high school, and watching how loose the Lions were in school, they went away quickly.

It also helped that the Lions jumped out to a lead early in Tuesday’s game, going up 2-0 in the second on RBI singles by Jack Williams and Gavin Martinkowski.

The Highlanders evened it up at 2-2 in the top of the third on a two-run double by Nick Hoorn, but the Lions got the lead right back in the bottom of the third on a sacrifice fly by Andrew Verona Kerley. 

“Our biggest thing we told our boys that we play the best when we're ahead. You look at our schedule, games that we lost were games that we got far behind. So I said, it's really important against a good staff, a good coached team that we need to come out, bat strong, scratch a couple off and then play from the lead,” Stephenson said. “Aiden Robinson, when you give them the lead, it's lights out.”

Robinson went one out into the sixth, giving up two runs on five hits, striking out six and walking two.

“He’s blinders on. He's a great athlete, you know, a great kid. And then when he's locked in, he's tough to mess up, that's for sure,” Stephenson said. “He wasn't our top guy at the beginning of the year, but he’s kind of fallen into that role as our ace the last month of the season. And the boys are gravitating around it. The team is doing awesome. And we're just kind of riding him right now, which is great to see.”

Thunder halted the game in the top of the sixth, and with as much dark green packing the radar — and dark clouds packing the northern skyline north of M-59 — it seemed like the game might be over. 

Once it resumed in the rain an hour and 17 minutes later, though, it was very much a contest.

Neko Hall walked to start the second portion of the game, then JT Thomas was hit by a pitch, putting the potential tying and go-ahead runs on base with one out. 

A wild pitch eventually moved them both into scoring position.

Was the Lions’ junior reliever getting a bit nervous?

“No. I mean, I — OK, yeah, I was nervous. I have confidence in this team. I've never been part of a team that's been as unified. Andbeing able to rely on them as a pitcher makes it a lot easier to get out of tough situations like that,” Mathis said. “It was just that one hump. Once we got over that I kind of … hit my stride and found my groove. But it's just great having a defense and a shortstop like Braden Fox that can make a play like that to get us out of there.”

After Mathis got the inning’s second out with a strikeout looking, Fox ended the threat with an assist to nab the runner at first. 

After the Lions went down in order in the bottom of the frame, Mathis got a fly out and two straight strikeouts to close out the win. 

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BOYS BASKETBALL: Brother Rice beats Chippewa Valley to end 40-year drought between regional titles

TROY — Somebody was going to win their first regional boys basketball title since the Cold War still raged, Yuppies were a thing, and “The Simpsons” hadn’t yet hit the airwaves.

The other team was going to go back home, and stare up at a dusty, infrequently modified banner in its home gym.

And after getting knocked out of districts as the No. 1 team in the state a year ago, there was no way that the Bloomfield Hills Brother Rice Warriors were going to let that latter team be them.

They led wire-to-wire in Thursday’s Division 1 regional championship game at Troy High School, beating Chippewa Valley, 76-44, to claim their school’s first regional title since 1984.

The magnitude of ending a 40-year drought hadn’t quite registered with Rice’s Warren Marshall IV in the immediate aftermath.

“Not yet it will probably kick in, in a little bit, but I think it was kind of an emotional moment. Coach (Leon) McDonald (a 1999 Rice grad), the last time we made it to a regional championship was 26 years ago when he was a junior. So when he said that we're like, ‘We got end this,’” Marshall said of the assistant, who’s been on the Rice staff for 14 years, and was sent out to collect the trophy by head coach Rick Palmer. “And plus we had like half our school there. So it really meant a lot.”

The regional drought has lasted almost as long for Chippewa Valley, which hasn’t hoisted a trophy in this round since 1987. It meant something for the Big Reds (16-10) to have there Thursday night, too, with a crack at ending their own drought.

“That’s why I told him I said, you know, rough math in my head, there was probably like 160 Division 1 teams. And 144 of them would love to be where we are today,” Big Reds coach Corey Smith said. “You know, it didn't end is we we had hoped, but I knew how good that team was.”

The Warriors (20-6) entered the postseason as an honorable mention in the final Associated Press statewide rankings, after having finished tied for second in the Catholic League’s Central Division, and finishing runner-up to top-ranked Orchard Lake St. Mary’s in the CHSL tournament title game, with half of their losses coming against the Eaglets. 

Rice wasted no time in jumping on top of the Big Reds, though, scoring the game’s first six points, then pushing the lead to double digits at 13-2. 

The lead was 17-4 after one quarter, 38-16 at the half, and 58-28 entering the fourth. 

The Big Reds were hoping to keep it a low-scoring affair, like the one they’d won on Tuesday to get here, beating L’Anse Creuse North, 49-43.

“Certainly I knew we had a chance, if we got it close — you know that the underdog always has little advantage if it’s close at the end of the game. You know, and that was our goal to keep the game close. We we've never been a high octane scoring team,” Smith said. “Like I told them, if they get to 60, we lost the game. So we were trying to keep it, you know, somewhere around 50. And they today, they were just way too good for it.”

Marshall scored six of his 15 points in the first quarter, then Elijah Williams took over after that, finishing with 22, while Luke Salkowski added another 15 in the paint. 

Caleb Fowlkes had 10 points off the bench to lead the Big Reds, while Jordan Wright had eight. 

“They're a better version of us. And that was our detriment. You know, we've been able to speed teams up, run them off what they are able to do, and just at every position, they were a little taller, a little more athletic than our guys and that's, you know, they were able to do to us what we were able to do to most teams this year,” Smith said.

The Warriors will get another crack at the Eaglets (24-1), who beat Grand Blanc, 65-40, in the regional final at Milford on Thursday. That lines the two Catholic League rivals up for a rematch in the quarterfinals on Tuesday, back down at University of Detroit Mercy’s Calihan Hall. 

“We're happy but we got we still think there's bigger prizes ahead for us,” Palmer said. “We’ve been practicing really good and our focus levels were really good. I talk about this all the time — it’s not a team I worry about looking ahead. When we lost four in a row and when we won eight in a row, they kind of just kept doing things practicing the right way and getting better. So this team is really emotionally stable. And so they don't get — they're excited but they don't get too excited. … We’re gonna enjoy this one. We wanted to earn the right to play them (the Eaglets) for the fourth time and take our take one more shot at ‘em.”

https://www.theoaklandpress.com/2024/03/08/photo-gallery-from-chippewa-valley-vs-brother-rice-in-a-d1-boys-basketball-regional-final/

It was St. Mary’s that ended the run for then-No. 1 Rice in last year’s regional finals, making this year’s run all the sweeter. 

“Listen, that team (last year) that didn't get to do it set the set the tone for our culture, they put our program on the map. Without them, this probably isn’t possible, but this group, like stepped our culture up in some ways, you know, they kind of laid the groundwork and they kind of put some finishing details on the house,” Palmer said. “So I'm really happy for these guys.

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BOYS BASKETBALL: Milford puts early scare in St. Mary’s, before No. 1 Eaglets pull away in second half

MILFORD — For the first 15 minutes or so of Tuesday’s Division 1 regional semifinal, Orchard Lake St. Mary’s coach Todd Covert spent it alternating between feeling a lot of vindication, along with a little bit of gnawing dread.

His No. 1-ranked Eaglets were locked in a battle with the host Milford Mavericks — a team that he worried would give them a problem — and found themselves trailing, 17-15, after one quarter.

“At the end of the first quarter I said, ‘You guys trust me now?’” Covert said. “It got their attention, that's for sure.”

The Eaglets wouldn’t get it tied up again until 3:15 remained in the half, finally taking a lead at 20-19 with 2:48 left, then expanding it to 27-21 at the break, before using a 13-0 run in the third quarter to finally start pulling away.

That scoring run, along with limiting the Mavericks to four points in the second quarter, and two in the third, allowed the Eaglets to steadily pull away in the second half, eventually rolling to a 61-39 win.

But it was never easy.

“I told them, I said ‘I'm a Milford kid, I live right down the road. I tell you what, I'm proud of you guys out there.’ That's a well-coached team and tough. I woke up this morning at 3:30 in the morning. I was worried about this game. No question about it,” Covert said.

“I told coach (Dave Gilbert), I'd say that is probably as good defensive team as we've played all year. I mean, they might not have the athletes that a U-D (Jesuit) or Brother Rice has but systematically they check, they win that first dribble, they stick their nose in there, they're physical. They're not going to give you anything easy.”

The Eaglets (23-1) advance to Thursday’s regional final, where they’ll face Grand Blanc (16-8), fighting to determine which team gets to continue to chase another trip to Breslin Center. Both teams lost in last year’s D1 semifinals, St. Mary’s to eventual runner-up Muskegon, and Grand Blanc in overtime to eventual champion Cass Tech.

But this year’s run is a far cry from last year’s, when the unranked Eaglets were the underdogs in a run through a gauntlet of top-10 teams.

“There is (a difference). There absolutely is. There’s a lot of expectations, but we try to embrace it and and you know, this group plays hard, right?” Covert said. “They might not always shoot the ball well, or they might make mistakes, but they play hard on the defensive end and they rebound. And when you when you do that, you always got a really good chance even when you don't play very good.”

It may have looked like the Eaglets weren’t playing well in that early portion of the game, but credit the Milford defense for making it look that way.

“Honestly, I thought we played championship-level defense. There's no doubt in my mind about that. We just didn't hit some shots we normally hit,” Gilbert said. “We needed some shots to go down to beat a team like that. And it didn't happen tonight. But the game plan was there. The effort was there. The mentality was there. The heart was there. The pride was there. These guys gave us everything that they possibly could. And I think the whole gym saw that. And that's what I'm so proud of.”

It was still a one-possession affair into the final minutes of the first half, but after Jayden Savoury’s free throws put OLSM ahead, Trey McKenney hit a step-back 3-pointer just before the halftime buzzer to give the Eaglets a six-point lead at the break, 27-21.

Carson Lutz hit the Mavericks’ first basket of the second half to cut the Milford deficit to 29-23, but the Mavericks wouldn’t score again in the third, finding themselves looking up at a 42-23 deficit at the end of the quarter. Milford scored 16 points in the fourth, but didn’t really dent the lead much at all. 

The Mavericks never gave up, though.

For Gilbert, the biggest example of that was a flat-out hustle play by senior Tyler Freer, who chased down McKenney on a breakaway, and got his hand in to prevent the layup or dunk.

“We talked about it yesterday, because I'll tell you what, in today's generation, kids are scared to get (posterized) because they don't want to get put on phones and blown up on social media. And he didn't care about that. He didn't care about what the results of that play was gonna happen. He did it, he got a tip. And at the time, we thought it was off of them. That is rare. That is rare nowadays, because that's what I challenged these guys to do. And that is our program and what we've built our foundation on. And that play to me, summarized everything,” Gilbert said. 

“He could’ve quit on the play, the highlight dunk happens, the crowd goes crazy. And instead he makes the effort play. And that's what I hope these guys, these little kids, saw. What an environment tonight, man, and our community came out. Obviously, there were some basketball junkies want to see some good basketball and the No. 1 team in the state play. But I think there are a lot of people that came left pretty impressed with Milford basketball.”

McKenney had 20 points to lead all scorers, while Mason Wisniewski added 10 for the Eaglets and Daniel Smythe had nine.

Lutz finished with 11 points to lead the Mavericks (17-8), while James Stevenson added eight.

Milford will graduate nine seniors from this year’s team, but return two starters from Tuesday’s game in Lutz and Owen Stark. 

“You look at the gym tonight. You talk about Clarkson, Grand Blanc and Orchard Lake St. Mary’s. We could argue that's the blue blood of of Michigan basketball, right? And we're not a blue blood. But I want these kids right here that are standing with me right now to believe that a team from Milford can go do some special things in the state tournament,” Gilbert said, noting that he used the run by Howell — the team the Mavericks beat in the district finals — to the semis a few years ago as an example for his team. “This is our third regional semifinal in five years. So the stage wasn't the issue tonight, right? We just ran into a really good basketball team and we didn’t hit some shots that we needed to fall in order to beat them. I couldn't be prouder, man — couldn’t be prouder. Love this town, love our community, love our players and I hope people were able to see that tonight.”