Milan has advanced into the Class B state title game with a 51-50 semifinal victory Friday over Detroit Douglas. Latin Davis had 17 points and Nick Perkins added 16 points for Milan, which has a 24-3 record. Douglas was led by DeShawn Sanders with 15 points and ended the season at 18-9.
Benton Harbor was too much in a 69-52 victory over Cadillac on Friday in Class B semifinal action at the Breslin Center. Cortex More scored 18 points and had 11 rebounds for Benton Harbor, 16-9. Cadillac was led by Jalen Brooks with 30 points and six rebounds.
W. Robertson Jr. had 14 points and six boards while Joevair Kennedy added 14 points and five boars to lead 27-0 Muskegon to a 63-47 victory over Mount Pleasant in Class A quarterfinal action at the Breslin Center on Friday. Mount Pleasant’s season ended at 22-5. Muskegon was up 18-9 after the first quarter, 36-17 at halftime and 48-34 after the third quarter.
W. Robertson Jr. had 14 points and six boards while Joevair Kennedy added 14 points and five boars to lead 27-0 Muskegon to a 63-47 victory over Mount Pleasant in Class A quarterfinal action at the Breslin Center on Friday. Mount Pleasant’s season ended at 22-5. Muskegon was up 18-9 after the first quarter, 36-17 at halftime and 48-34 after the third quarter.
Muskegon remained undefeated at 27-0 with a 63-47 victory over Mount Pleasant in Class A semifinal action at the Breslin Center on Friday. Mount Pleasant’s season ended at 22-5. Jaleel Hogan led Mount Pleasant with 14 points and 10 rebounds while Aaron Leasher had six points and eight boards. Muskegon was up 18-9 after the first quarter 36-17 at halftime and 48-34 after the third quarter. Muskegon had a 15-13 advantage in the fourth.
Jake Herremans of Rockford and Jackson Maxwell of Swartz Creek were champion divers in Divisions 1 and 2, respectively, while Xinghao Wang of Grand Ledge won the Division 2 100-yard breaststroke to lead the area in the boys’ state swimming and diving championships.
DIVISION 1 AT SAGINAW VALLEY STATE UNIVERSITY
Brother Rice claimed the Division 1 state title with 345 points compared to 202 for Livonia Stevenson.
Rockford was 10th with 81 points. The Rams were led by Herremans, who was first in the one-meter dive. Shane Phillips was eighth.
The 200-yard medley relay team of Craig Wasberg, David Dewberger, Timmer Hoffmeister, and Chris Lemoine was sixth with a time of 1:36.87.
“We had a great season, but not a great state meet,” said Rockford coach Tom Parks. “Our divers did well, and we had a few really good performances, but not our best. We disqualified a relay which really hurt us. I hate to say it, but it was pretty obvious it was not a great call by the official. Regardless, I’m very proud of my team and all their hard work.”
DIVISION 2 AT EASTERN MICHIGAN UNIVERSITY
Birmingham Seaholm won the Division 2 title with 357.5 points, finishing ahead of Dexter with 203. Midland Dow was ninth at 122.5, Grand Ledge 11th at 68, Okemos 12th at 67, Heritage 13th at 55, and Waverly-Lansing Catholic 14th at 53. Jackson Maxwell scored all of Swartz Creek’s 20 points by winning the one-meter dive. Xinghao Wang of Grand Ledge was first in the 100-yard breaststroke in 55.77 seconds, while Logan Yearham and Tyler Miller of Heritage were fourth in 58.07 and sixth in 59.74, respectively.
Top local performances also included Ben Rentz taking fourth for Waverly-Lansing Catholic in the 200-yard freestyle in 1:41.83. Nehemiah Mork was fourth for Midland Dow in the 500-yard freestyle, while Jake Seeterlin of Okemos was ninth. Wang was third in the 100-yard butterfly in 50.60 seconds and Ian Polland of Okemos ninth in 51.41 seconds.
Midland Dow placed second and seventh in the 100-yard freestyle, with Mork clocking a time of 46.47 seconds and Zach Hoffman finishing in 46.94 seconds.
Rentz of Waverly-Lansing Catholic finished third in the 500-yard freestyle in 4:37.79.
Midland Dow was sixth in the 200-yard freestyle relay with the foursome of Mork, Hoffman, Nick Pixton, and Nick Smith.
The Dow 400-yard freestyle relay team of Mork, Hoffman, Ricky Knoff, Smith finished eighth in 3:14.80.
“We broke 11 school records and placed a program-best 11th,” said Grand Ledge coach Ian Townsend. “We took 11 swimmers and divers to states from a team with 16 guys and won the program’s first ever CAAC Blue Conference championship.
“Definitely Xinghao’s state title swim had to be the most impressive swim of the weekend. His time is sixth fastest in MHSAA history and currently 12th nationally this season.
“Our relays performed remarkably well this year, and that culminated with our 200 medley relay and 400 free relay becoming the first two relays in school history to place top 16 at the state meet. Senior diver Rob Wilson placed 12th in that event and made remarkable strides this season. It was a great season overall with lots of program-first performances.”
Okemos “finished the season very well with a share in our seventh CAAC Blue title as well as a high finish at the state meet. We scored two relays and had six individual scoring swims in the top 16,” said Okemos coach Patrick Saucedo. “Our two relays, 200 medley and 400 free, were our fastest of the season by a lot. It was great to see those four guys bring it together one last time.
“We pretty much knew our standings going in and thought our performances and placings were pretty close to where we expected to end up. It was a very successful season. This season I had most individual state swims between all of my other years coaching.”
DIVISION 3 AT HOLLAND AQUATIC CENTER
Cranbrook Kingswood won the Division 3 meet with 297 points over Chelsea with 273.33. Ionia was 11th at 69, John Glenn 17th at 29, St. Johns and Mason tied for 20th at 24. Alma finished 23rd with 22 points, Haslett 27th with eight, Ovid-Elsie 28th with six, and DeWitt 33rd with one.
Logan Carson of John Glenn was fifth in the 50-yard freestyle.
Jared Gregory of St. Johns was fourth in the one-meter dive with 400.9 points. Brevan Bender of Alma was fourth in the 100-yard butterfly and Corbin Shuler of Mason eighth. Skyler Fish of Ionia was fifth in the 100-yard freestyle and second in the 100-yard backstroke for Ionia.
“We were very pleased with the final outcome of our season,” said St. Johns coach Kim Brewbaker. “The local paper had picked us to finish in fourth place and we were third in the final standings. This season we beat a couple of teams that had beaten us last season, and one of our losses was a one-point loss. Our guys swam faster than last season, and we had a fantastic conference meet.
“We finished about where we thought we would. We hoped to place in the top 20 at the Division 3 state meet, and that’s where we ended up. Our guys turned in our fastest times of the season in the events we qualified in, but they weren’t fast enough to make the top 16 in most of our entries.”
Marshall Gallt was Ovid-Elsie’s only qualifier, and he placed 15th in the 200 IM and 14th in the 100 fly.
“He had been at states the last two years and was an alternate for finals both years,” said Ovid-Elsie coach Karl Dahlke. “This year he qualified for finals in both his events by dropping 6.28 seconds in the IM and 2.39 seconds in the fly. Both set our school records. We hit his taper perfectly.”
He’s only a sophomore.
Jake Herremans of Rockford might only be a 10th grader, but he’s a Division 1 state champion in the one-meter dive.
He pulled off the trick at the state swimming and diving meet at Saginaw Valley State University.
Rockford finished 10th as a team in the meet, led by Herremans, who had a 320.65 in the semifinal and a 458.90 in the final. Second-place finisher was Dakota Hurbis, a freshman from Saline, who had a 433.25.
“I won by 25 points, which is a decent margin,” Herremans said.
Rockford coach Tom Parks had a quick reply when asked for key to Herremans’ success. “Hard work, hard work, and a lot of confidence,” Parks answered. “He trains year round and is never satisfied with current success. He wants to improve consistently. He also dives year round with another top diver from Rockford, senior Shane Phillips. They push each other.”
Phillips placed eighth in the one-meter dive at the state finals this year.
Parks noted that Herremans has shown improvement from last season. “He was a very solid diver his freshman year,” Parks said, noting that Herremans was ninth at state. “But he really worked on improving his [degree of difficulty] from his freshman year. He added a whole new list of dives to his 11-dive performance.”
Herremans has been diving since the seventh grade, and it’s his second year of high school diving.
He went into the state finals this season ranked No. 1. “I knew I had a good shot at it,” Herremans said, adding that coming into the season, “I knew I had good shot at top three or top five. I didn’t know until mid season that I would have a good shot of winning at state.”
Herremans said that one of the improvements he’s made as a sophomore is going into the water with a smaller splash.
He worked during the off-season with a USA diving club, and he indicated that his confidence with his work on the diving board has especially increased this season.
Parks called Herremans’ state finals performance “awesome. Not only did he dive well and broke the varsity record, but he did so under great pressure,” Parks said. “There were several divers near him scorewise through much of the meet. He will not only be awarded all-American, but I suspect he will be listed in the top 15 high school divers in the United States.”
What obviously excites Parks and the Rams is that Herremans has two years of high school eligibility remaining.
“He will not rest on this, he will raise the bar for himself,” Parks said. “I have no doubt. He has the potential at being one of the best divers to ever come out of Michigan.”
Looking ahead, Herremans simply wants to get better. “I can’t let my head get too big,” he said, “and I need to keep getting stronger and improve my form and keep getting higher for increasing the difficulty of dives.”
Diving is his only event. He played baseball last spring but is now focusing strictly on diving.
“I like the feel of being in the air and flipping,” he said.
Jackson Maxwell saved his best for the right time.
The Swartz Creek senior won the first-place one-meter dive medal in mid March at the Division 2 Boys Swimming and Diving state finals. He had a semifinal score of 306.55 and a final score of 437.50 His closest competitor, with a 375.20 final score, was Sebastian Fay of Birmingham Seaholm. Maxwell scored all 20 of Swartz Creek’s points, and the team finished 21st out of 28.
John Maxwell, the team’s coach and Jackson’s father, coaches the swimmers and divers. He’s been the head coach at Swartz Creek for five years and assisted the girls’ program for five years prior to taking on his current role.
This was Jackson’s first state final. He started diving competitively his freshman year. “I would go to my dad’s meets when I was a little kid, and I would dive,” he recalled. “I would sit through practices and meets and watch. That interested me. I got to high school and I decided to give it a try. I never dove with a club team or went to camps for diving.”
To be a successful diver, “you have to learn to be eloquent and learn to do the dives,” Jackson said. “Once you do them, it becomes muscle memory. You have to repeat the dives. We do them all a bunch of times, so we get the feeling of where to tuck and how to come out of it.”
He placed sixth as a sophomore and 10th as a junior at the state meets.
“We knew there was a chance [for first place],” John said. “He was seeded fourth. If he dove well, there would be a chance he could pull it off and win. He worked very hard. He went in with a very good attitude that he would have fun his senior year, go in and do ‘the best I can and whatever happens happens.’ But he wanted to have fun. I knew he was going to do well. He was relaxed. His teammates kept him positive with encouragement. I had two other state qualifiers there as well. As a team, they went in that all three of them would do the best they could.
“His goal was to have a blast, and he did,” John said. “If he hit all of his dives and was consistent, then the chances of him placing higher were great. He did not make a mistake at all. He did very well.”
“I was seeded fourth at the state meet,” Jackson noted. “I was completely going to be happy if I took fourth place. I just wanted to take [top] eight and be all-state again. I realized I had a possibility of being a state champ after the ninth round of diving at the state meet. The kid that would have had a chance of besting me [messed up] one of his dives. Then I knew I had a big chance of winning the state meet.
“It wasn’t my best. I could have done better. My scores were average to above average. I didn’t miss any dives.”
Each season, Maxwell improved his diving performance. He felt his best improvement came during this fourth year. “I was high 200s my sophomore and junior year,” he said. “This year I went in the mid-300s. I went from a 287, which was my best last year, to a 351 this year for six dives.”
The regional and state meets consist of 11 dives.
Maxwell also swam two other races during the season, the 200 medley relay as a breaststroker and the 100 breaststroke. He was the team’s No. 1 breaststroker the last two seasons. He was seventh at the league meet in the 100 breaststroke. A four-sport athlete, he focuses on swimming and diving from November to March.
“After my junior year, I coached out in a Fenton area school some littler kids, and I got on the board a little bit,” he said.
He also plays football and soccer, and he runs track.
“Soccer is his favorite sport, but he excels the best at diving,” John Maxwell said. “In football, he’s a very talented kicker, one of the best in the state. He’s all-league all-district soccer player. He’s a 6’4″ high jumper. He’s a well-rounded athlete and loves every sport.”
He’s also a long jumper and sprinter in track. He’s been accepted at Kettering University in Flint to study in mechanical engineering. But he’s also looking at Hope College for the possibility of playing football.
The Halee Nieman File
Bullock Creek
Class: Junior
Sport: Basketball
Season Accolades: Helped lead her team to Class B semifinal for second consecutive year before losing to Grand Rapids South Christian 52-47. Scored a team-high 18 points and had six rebounds and seven steals in the semifinal. Bullock Creek finished the season 24-2.
The Dustin Neyer File
Sacred Heart Academy
Class: Senior
Season Accolades: Hit the dramatic game-winning shot against Fulton that gave his team a Class D regional title. The video of his shot made ESPN’s Top Play of the Day and Fox Sports Top Play of the Day, and it was also on CNN. Sacred Heart went on to lose to Frankfort in the quarterfinal.
The Rachel McInerney File
Nouvel Catholic Central
Class: Senior
Season Accolades: Guided the Nouvel girls basketball team to Class C state championship with a 62-40 victory over St. Ignace. Scored 22 points and grabbed 23 rebounds in championship game. Reached the 1,000-point mark for her career in the quarterfinal victory over St. Louis. Earned AP Class C all-state honors.
College: Will play basketball at Ferris State University
The Nick Spitzley File
Pewamo-Westphalia
Class: Senior
Season Accolades: Scored game-winning shot to knock off defending Class C champion Beecher in the quarterfinal. Scored 22 points in semifinal win over Muskegon-Heights to send his team to the final against Detroit Consortium. Earned Class C AP all-state first team honors.
College: Will play basketball at Grand Valley State University
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