 White Cloud defeated Tri-County with scores of 26-24, 22-25, 28-26, 27-25. Coach Strait: “Congratulations to the Lady Indians on their conference win last night. Jayla Perrin and Gaby Reeve had a great night offensively led by Hailee Brown and Jaden Gomez. Defensively, Kiara Edwards was aggressive on the net, while Jayla, Brooke and Ryleigh took care of business in the back row. Serving was led by Jayla with 15 points and 4 aces, followed by Hailee with 12 points and 6 aces. We look to host Central Montcalm next Tuesday."  
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 Mystery ref returns for another season By Ken DeLaat, N3 Sports “In football everything is complicated by the presence of the opposite team.”- Jean-Paul Sartre All 6 of our local teams are at home Thursday and what better way to welcome in the Labor Day weekend than sitting in the stands of a high school football game? Fremont and White Cloud enter week 2 as the only undefeated teams (1-0) but it is definitely but it is seriously early in the season and we have 5 new coaches still integrating their brand of football into their teams. Newaygo and Grant begin conference play while Fremont Hesperia White Cloud and Holton tune up with one more noncom game before heading into league competition. Big Rapids at Newaygo Both teams fell short in their openers last week. And while the Cardinals made it into the endzone three times in their loss to Coopersville, the Lions have yet to see any points put on the board. BR faced a Bronco team that seemed capable of scoring at will as they yielded 42 points while Newaygo held Kent City to just under half that. Early in the season, but the Cards have always proved to be tough competitors and the Lions will have to find a way to generate more offense than they did last week when the Eagles seemed to have a player in their huddle. This will be the last home game for the Lions before the rivalry game with Grant later in the month so the fans are going to be hungry for that first win. Beaverton at Fremont The Packer faithful will be filling the stands as they evaluate the new version of Fremont Football in the home opener. The team notched a win on the road last week defeating Hart and Coach Hudson praised the work of his defense and o-line in his post game words. We don’t know much about the Beavers, and they lost their opener to Evart but they have a lot of personnel back from last season and look to compete in the always tough Jack Pine Conference. The Pack will be initiated into the WMC next week when they welcome in a strong Oriole team and a win here would provide some needed momentum going forward. Chippewa Hills at Grant The Tigers are at home facing a Warrior team that was taken out of the game early last week by a formidable Gladwin team that scored twice in the first four minutes and held the top CH rusher to just 38 yards. Grant lost a tough one to a strong Comstock Park team but the warriors aren’t the Panthers and the Tiger defense isn’t likely to be any more forgiving than the Flying G’s were last week. Should be a good home opener for new Head Coach Jason Hil and the Tiger fans. Hart at White Cloud The Cloud has a shot at going 2-0 but it won’t come easy against the Pirates. A spirited defensive effort by Fremont kept Hart in check and the WC D will want to put together some early stops because their visitors have a lot more weapons than they showed last week. Stopping Pirate RB Joseluis Andaverde will be a priority Perry at Holton The Red Devils opened against a Manistee team that looks to be a top contender in the Lakes Division of the WMC and their size and speed enabled them to take control early. Coach Moore’s team gets a chance to reboot here but Rambler qb Austin Poirier is an absolute force on the field and engineered a 4th quarter comeback in their opener. Containing him will be the key but it ain’t gonna be easy. St Louis at Hesperia The Panthers came up just short in their opener but Thursday they give home fans another shot at celebration when they go up against St Louis. The Sharks qb Thomas Zacharko can do a lot of things well and will be tough to rein in so the Panther offense will need to once again put up some points to capture this one. Prewitt, Vissia tally for Fremont
The Cardinals of Big Rapids traveled down to Fremont for a non-conference match-up in boys soccer. It was a back and forth event as the score remained even at the halfway point 0-0. Fremont struck first 5 minutes into the second half as Deagan Klimek crossed a ball to Killian Prewitt who finished on a volley. Big Rapids answered with 23 minutes to play when Owen Gammons broke free and finished a breakaway. Just 30 seconds later Gammons had another breakaway making the score 2-1 in favor of Big Rapids. Fremont knotted the match at 2-2 with 18 minutes to play when John Vissia finished a ball from Trent Buitendorp. That score stood and the match was a draw. Big Rapids outshot Fremont 8-7. Fremont's goalkeeper Caleb Vissia made 6 saves in net while Big Rapids' keeper Brock Smith made 5 saves for the Cardinals. Fremont moved to 2-3-1 overall and Big Rapids moved to 2-3-1 overall as well.  H.S. Season kicks off with Pack, Cloud posting wins N3 Sports- Of the 6 teams N3 endeavors to cover 5 are starting their seasons with new head coaches calling the shots. Joe Gorman, who guided his WC team to their most wins in a season since 2003, is the only returnee to the local coaching fraternity. It should be an interesting year. Fremont, Hesperia and Holton have joined the WMC leaving just 4 teams in the Silver Division of the CSAA and 7 in the Gold. The Packers will be competing in the Lakes Division while the Devils and Panthers will do battle in the Rivers Division. We will begin posting our football preview articles this week so stay tuned... Fremont 22 Hart 8 The last time the Packers won their season opener was 2014 when most of the players on the current team were tackling 4th grade math or 3rd grade science at Daisy Brook. And speaking of history they were opening against Hart, a team they faced in the first game of the season for 16 straight years back in the 50’s and 60’s . It was also the first game for new Packer Head Coach Jared Hudson who will be bringing his team into the rugged West Michigan Conference Lakes Division this season. The homefield Pirates tallied first after a scoreless first quarter going up 8-0 and it appeared they would carry that lead into halftime before a drive in the closing minutes culminated with quarterback Kyler DeKuiper taking it in from 2 yards out just before intermission. He repeated the feat on the conversion and the teams went to the locker rooms knotted at 8. In the second half the Packer defense came up big starting with a pick 6 by Michael Romero early in the third that gave Fremont the 14-6 lead after a failed conversion. The 4th saw the defense continuing to hold off the Pirates while Justin Dirheimer kept piling up the yards including a 4 yard rumble into the endzone to cap the scoring for the evening. Dirheimer led all rushers collecting 168 yards on 31 carries and DeKuiper kept the defense honest with a 6 pack of short passes and a 21 yard strike to Carl Vliem. Romero added 6 solo tackles to his interception and Owen Hertel added 4. The Packers play their home opener this Thursday when they host Beaverton. The Beavers dropped their Friday road game to Evart 34-20. We caught up with Coach Hudson to pose a few questions. This is the first time Fremont has won an opener since 2014. What does this mean to the players and fans? Our players were very excited after the game. We have talked a lot this fall camp about legacy and how they want to be remembered, and this is a definite step in the right directions. Looks like the defense played pretty steady and even put up points. Got any comments on their play? Our defensive game plan was very solid this week. Our kids did an awesome job of sticking to their keys and making plays when they had opportunities. Michael Romero making a great pick six and Briar Hambrock forcing and recovering a fumble are the type of plays we need out of our seniors. Your o-line must have opened up some nice holes for Dirheimer. New players, returnees, or a combo? We were lucky to be returning 3 guys from the previous year (Andrew Steger, Kyle Nagel, and Preston Hunt). Chance Crawford (SO) and Gabe Van Vleet (SR) are our new additions that really sure up the line for us. Justin is a dynamic runner, but the play up front helped us control the game and led to Hart having only 11 plays on offense in the 2nd half. Any surprises? Junior Owen Hertel played a great game defensively for us. He had to set the edge for us all night and did a nice job, including a huge TFL on one of their trick plays. White Cloud 40 Shelby 20 The White Cloud Varsity football team came out of week 1 with a win over a tough Shelby team. Leading the defense was Jace Silverthorn and Lloyd Sebright-Johnson with 11 tackles each while Carlos Brown added 10 tackles, a sack, and an interception. Other defensive contributors were Alex Cruzan with 7 tackles, Xander Traynor with 6 and a forced fumble, and Landyn McGowen added 4 with a fumble recovery. Offensively the Indians were led by a strong O-line that aided in Mason Ruether throwing for 37 yards including a toss to Nate Compeau for a touchdown, Landyn McGowen rushing for 110 yards and a TD, and Jace Silverthorn rushing for 315 yards and 4 touchdowns. The team is back in action Thursday, September 1st, at home against Hart. Manistee 54 Holton 6 The Chips started scoring early when Max Miles took the opening kickoff 87 yards and just like that the hosts were on the board. Not for the last time. Manistee built a 35-0 halftime advantage and coasted to the non-con win in the debut game of Red Devil Head Coach Tom Moore. The imposing o-line of the Chippewas opened holes for a quintet of runners who amassed 338 yards with each tallying a TD. Mistakes hurt the Devs as their hosts twice followed up touchdowns by recovering the ensuing squib kicks and forcing another pair of turnovers. Chase Albright hit Hunter Zang for a 13 yard scoring strike to account for the lone RD score. Holton managed just 83 yards on 42 plays. Coach Moore: “The game didn’t go as planned for sure, we came out a little flat. For a lot of our guys it was their first varsity experience. We faced a bigger team, but that doesn’t matter. Every school is bigger to us, we just need to focus and regroup for next week.” The Red Devils will look to turn things around Thursday when they host Perry in a noncon matchup. The Ramblers defeated Clawson in their season opener Manton 37 Hesperia 34 The Panthers will host St. Louis on Thursday. The Sharks lost 20-14 to Calvin Christian in their opener. Thursday Comstock Park 24 Grant 14 For the second year in a row the Tigers opened against the Panthers of Comstock Park. And while the results were better than last year's shellacking, the visitors fell short in the noncon matchup. “We made some big plays and I loved my team’s toughness,” said First Year Head Coach Jason Hill. Tiger fans will get a chance to see how the ‘22 version of Grant Tigers football looks Thursday when they begin a three game homestand with a conference opener against Chippewa Hills. The Warriors were manhandled by Gladwin in their debut game, falling 66-0. Other games of interest: Reed City 64 Orchard View 16 Coopersville 42 Big Rapids 19 Central Montcalm 38 Morley Stanwood 0 Tri County 50 Lakeview 19 Gladwin 62 Chippewa Hills 0 Ludington 37 Petoskey 31 Oakridge 30 Sparta 14 Whitehall 54 Unity Christian 26 Montague 20 Spring Lake 17 Catholic Central 24 N.Muskegon 22 Frankfort 33 Mason County Central 16 Beal City 22 Ravenna 21 By popular demand the mystery ref will be back on our preview stories once again this season.   Delamater, Losee pace Grant harriers On Wednesday, the Tigers traveled to Baker Woods to compete in one of the most challenging courses in Michigan. All the athletes battled and ran fantastic. Brodie Delamater led the boys team clocking a time of 19:08 and finished 2nd place. Charlie Atwood finished 15th in 23:05. Logan Kilbreath finished 17th in 23.30. Anthony Castillo clocked a 26:00 and finished 25tth In his cross country debut, Gabe Malone ran a 34:38. Avary Losee led the girls team in 29:15 and a 12th place finish. Cyanne Schuitema ran a 39:07 and finished 23rd. The team is back in action on September 10th when we travel to Fremont for the Hill and Bale Invite.  Visiting Eagles Dominate Lions in Week One Football Kent City 20 Newaygo 0 There were more differences in the matchup between the Kent City Eagles and the Newaygo Lions from last year to this year than there were similarities. Differences? 1: Both teams were starting the season with new head coaches. Newaygo's coach being Scott Force, new to Newaygo football completely, hired mid-summer to replace Mike Allison. And Kent City's new coach, Zach Gropp, who spent five years coaching with previous head coach Bill Crane before being hired to lead the helm. 2: Kent City and Newaygo are now both part of a restructured CSAA League, with 11 teams competing. Prior to this year, Kent City was in the silver division, while Newaygo was big enough to be in the gold division. 3: Home field advantage would be with the Lions this year. 4: Last year the Lions played a solid first half, only to fall in the second half almost single-handedly to Mason Westbrook's complete dominance running the ball from the backfield. This year? The Lions played a much more productive second half than first. Similarities? 1: The Eagles won in both 2021 and 2022. 2: Mason Westbrook for the Eagles sure can run a ball without the Lions defense being able to do much about it. Next week Newaygo will stay home to face off against the Big Rapids Cardinals. 
  From Coach Strait:
Tonight the Lady Indians played on their home court for the first time this season. Hosting Baldwin Panthers and Holton Red Devils. After some dominating offense the first match, we battled back and forth with Holton. At the end of the night, we came away with two wins. After being down by 4 to Holton in the third set, the ladies battled back to win 15-11. Leading scorers on the night were Hannah Cruzan with 14 points and 3 aces, followed by Kiara Edwards with 12 points. Some great defense was played by Jaden Gomez, Jayla Perrin and Ryleigh Balke. Gaby Reeve had an aggressive night on the net. We open conference play on Tuesday when we host Tri-County.  Fremont and Newaygo played a nonconference match on Thursday afternoon in Fremont. Fremont took the lead when Deagan Klimek found Joey Mansfield for the first goal of the match. The Packers built their lead when Mansfield passed a ball to Justin Guanga who finished it making it 2-0. Newaygo's Alex Hall answered just 2 minutes later to make the score 2-1 at the half. Fremont scored first in the second half when John Vissia chipped a ball to the head of Klimek making it 3-1. Newaygo's Hall added one more with 10 minutes left in the match from Jonathan Bishoff. That score stood as Fremont won 3-2. Fremont outshot Newaygo 12-4. Fremont's Ben Mellema made 2 saves in net and Newaygo's Pablo Echavarria made 9 saves for the visitors. Fremont improved to 2-1 overall and Newaygo fell to 2-2.
 White Cloud Harriers Off to Quick Start
The White Cloud Cross Country team competed at the Chippewa Hills Early Season invitational on August 23rd. The boys team secured the victory in the small school division. Leading the charge was Coleson Cruzan with a third place finish with a time of 18:20. He was followed by Carson Foondle (6th), Kaleb Canning (9th), Malachi Graves (15th), Wyatt Karnes (17th), Avery Bowman (20th), Christian Ringler (21st), Donnie Grovesteen (25th), Keagan Kailing (32nd), and Zane Keith (51st). Wyatt, Donnie set Personal Best times. The Lady Indians finished in fourth place, led by Annie Feldpausch in 9th place. Rounding out the scoring seven were Brooklyn Foondle (13th), Kiara Edwards (15th), Jolena Deaton (17th), Gaby Reeve (30th), Grace Richards (32nd), Makayla Sheldon (35th). Sydnee Ochs set a personal best time and finished 42nd.  Hesperia Varsity Volleyball fell short in both of their opening matches against Spring Lake and Kent City last night hosted by the Lakers. The Panthers lost game one to Spring Lake with the score 22-25 and the game two score was 23-25.
Senior Setter Lacey McCallum led the Panthers in assists, kills, and aces for the night. McCallum had 17 assists, 9 kills, and 9 aces for the Panthers. Senior hitter Triniti Tanner had 7 kills for the Panthers and led defensively with 22 digs. Returning Junior Kayla Rumsey also had 7 kills, before an injury shortened her outstanding set against the Eagles. Senior Emma Muckey had 11 digs and an ace on the night. The Panthers will play at the WMC tourney on Saturday, August 20th! |
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