2021 Portage Invitational
70s and humid – no wind It was a good day for the Packers on Homecoming day. The day got a little warm due to humidity, but was pretty good running conditions. The course is a double loop course, and we talked about moving up in the second loop and the girls did just that. Senior Taava Johnson led the way running a PR 20:53, moving up 17 places in the 2nd mile, and 8 more in the 3rd. Elise Pfeiffer (so) also PR’d today, 24:36, moving up 6 slots and 8 in the 2nd and 3rd miles. Shyann Callison (fr) ran 25:10 to PR by almost 3 minutes. She also moved up each mile. Rachel Maddox also ran her best time of 25:33. The girls did a great job running in a huge race, 50 teams were on the line with 306 finishers. The boys varsity turned in a great showing placing 4th in the 50 team field and were 1 point out of 3rd. This was an awesome learning experience for our young squad. The team also did a great job moving up throughout the race. When scored by the mile the team was in 10th (351 pts) place at the mile, moved up to 6th (295 pts) at the 2 mile mark, and finished in 4th with 257 points. Conor Somers (sr) was our first finisher in 4th place at 15:51. He moved up from 11th at the mile. Brennon Schuler (sr) moved up big, 26 places in the 2nd mile and 11 in the 3rd to run 16:57. Gavin Schuler (sr) had a great 2nd mile, moving up 17 places, but faded a little in the 3rd mile running in 17:01. Then came the underclassmen. I have been impressed with the growth of this group. They are having ups and downs, but are learning and getting better. Cole Lowery (fr) ran a PR 17:40 moving up 26 places from the 1st mile. John Christensen (so), moved up 39 places from the mile to run 17:57. Sean Pettis (so) ran a 15 second PR moving up 37 places to finish with a 17:59. Carter Sherman (fr) PR’d by 34 seconds (18:21) in a race that we felt he did not run that great in. I know that sounds kind of bad, but when you run a PR in a bad race, that’s a good sign. The boys JV team kept the ball rolling with Freshman Gabe Jones winning the race in 17:45 to PR by 35 seconds. Gary Springstead (jr) placed 5th after done a great job moving up and getting across some pretty big gaps to PR in 18:19. Luke Bradley (fr) move up 37 places after the first mile to run 19:41, while Blake Taylor (fr) ran 20:24, moving up 13 places from the 1st mile. Results can be found here - https://www.portageinvite.com/race-results they seem to work best on a cell phone. Our next race will be the conference championships on October 19 at Branstrom Park – 4:30. Coach
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Big Rapids 21 Grant 12 The Cardinals jumped to a 14-0 lead before Brady Jacobs led the Tigers on a 16 play drive capped by a 5 yard TD run to cut the deficit to 14-6 with 1:10 left in the half. Big Rapids controlled the 3rd quarter with a 10 minute scoring drive to extend the lead to 21-6. Grant closed out the scoring with another Jacobs touchdown run from 11 yards out with 4:01 left in the game. Jacobs led the offense with 160 yards on 34 carries, two touchdowns, and 73 yards passing. The defense was led by Treyton Railling with 8 tackles and a tackle for loss, as well as Nolan Corvers with 8 tackles . Sawyer Carr and Ryan Chapin each had 5 tackles, including one tackle for loss. Zachary Barnhart had two interceptions for the Tigers. Holton 56 Hesperia 12 Austin Fowler tossed for 6 touchdowns with Bret Hosmer gathering in 3 of them as the Red Devils simply ran away from the Panthers. The annual rivalry game featured a dominant performance by the Holton offense as the visitors had no answers for the Devils passing game. Rice Robins, Kevin Erickson, and Teagan Bayne also pulled in TD catches. The Holton defense was led by Dylan Cartwright who finished with 10 tackles, while Robins notched 8 and Fowler added 6. Kaleb Nichols and Aaron Waterman each recovered a fumble and Cameron Edgerton picked off a Panther pass. Holton (3-2, 4-3) kept their playoff hopes alive with the win and after what is likely to be a forfeit by Wyoming Lee next week, they will host Newaygo in their regular season finale with a shot at the postseason Kent City 50 White Cloud 14 The Eagles rolled past the Cloud running up a 28-0 lead by halftime. White Cloud (2-3, 4-3) will host White Pigeon from the Southwest 10 conference next week while Kent City (3-1,4-2) will welcome in Hartford from the same conference. Tri County 16 Central Montcalm 6 The Vikings punched their playoff card with win # 6, the most wins by a TC team since the 2004 team that finished 9-2 including a playoff win. TC (5-1, 6-1) visits Big Rapids next week. First home win since ‘18
Fremont 32 Chippewa Hills 6 Justin Dirheimer ran wild against the Chip Hills defense piling up 231 yards and finding paydirt 3 times as the Packers got off the schneid and posted their first win on the field since their victory over the Warriors a year ago and the first home win since 2018. Dirheimer scored twice in the opening frame on runs from 40 and 16 yards and Alex Gleason followed up with a second quarter TD to make it 20-0 at intermission. Halfway through the third Gleason hit Wei Chen for a 26 yard strike. The visitors got on the board later in the third to make it 26-6 but the Packer defense that had kept them in check all night didn’t allow another score and Dirheimer broke loose in the 4th for a 50 yard TD to finish the scoring and deliver the win to Fremont. Gleason finished with 75 yards on the ground and hit on 5 of 7 passes for 32 yards. The defense was led by Connor Pettis, Owen VandenBerg, Michael Romero and Andrew Steger. Fremont (1-5, 1-6) will head to Coyote country next week to face the league leading Reed City (6-0, 6-1) Wednesday night, the Lady Indians dropped a tough game to Holton by scores of 14-25, 17-25, 25-21, 16-25. Leaders on the night were Ceara Bode with 3 aces. Aby Derks, once again, led in kills with 12, followed by Carsyn Scarlavai with 8. Carsyn also led with 22 assists. Our defense was led by Elizabeth Compeau with 31 digs followed by Jaden Gomez with 21. The Hesperia Panthers defeated the Lakeview Wildcats last night in Lakeview in 3 straight sets to bring their league record to an even 3-3. They were almost back to almost back to a full team after a year of quarantine and injuries that have plagued the Panthers this season. Senior Emmet Tinkham led the team with 9 kills, Kayla Rumsey had 5 kills, Elli McAree and Lacey McCallum each had 4 kills. McCallum also led with 5 aces, Alex Glenn had 4 aces, and McAree and Tinkham each added 2 aces. McCallum had 18 assists on the night and 13 digs. Glenn had 12 digs, Ali Townsend and Emma Joppich had 7 and 6 digs respectively. McAree had the solo block for the Panthers on the night. The Panthers will host the Kent City Eagles at home next Wednesday, October 13th in league competition. CSAA Jamboree 2 at Big Rapids
Warm sun For various reasons, this is the first time we have run at Big Rapids since the mid 2000s. The course has changed, but is still a pretty tough course. The girls led things off and I was most impressed with their last 400 meters as a whole. It was good to see Taylor Mater (sr) back in action as she slowly worked her way up through the field to finish 4th , just missing 3rd in a sprint finish. Taava Johnson (sr) had a strong last 400 to place 8th. Elise Pfeiffer (so) never looked like she got into a rhythm, but she had a great last 400 closing a 20 meter on the gradual uphill, to be able to cut loose on the down hill to pass and hold off a girl from Big Rapids. Rachel Maddox (fr) and Shyann Callison (fr) battled each other over the last 400, each with a strong finish. Carol Portelinha (sr) and Marcella De Aquino (sr) also had great last 400s to catch and pass competitors. The girls placed 6th with 116 pts. Conor Somers (sr) led the way for the boys winning the meet. He was followed by Brennan and Gavin Schuler (sr) in 3rd and 4th, both running a strong last 400. Cole Lowery (fr) ran pretty solid to finish 11th. I felt that Carter Sherman (fr) ran a pretty strong race, he got out and put himself in the mix in the first mile. He paid a little in the second and third miles, but held on pretty well, and then finished with a strong last 400. Johnny Christensen (so) lost a shoe in the second mile, but stayed pretty composed and was able to outsprint an athlete in the last 100. Sean Pettis (so), Gary Springstead (jr), Blake Taylor (fr), and Luke Bradley (fr) all had solid races. The boys won with 33 points. Full results can be found here - https://www.athletic.net/CrossCountry/meet/197811/results Coach Ciolk, Cruzan, Canning finish top 5
Photos by Joan Ludtke Coach Atwood: White Cloud Cross Country hosted the third CSAA Jamboree of the season and the boys team remains undefeated in league competition. All the boys raced aggressively and finished strong, resulting in the Indians beating runner-up Kent City by 10 points. White Cloud placed eight runners ahead of Kent City's fifth runner, pushing back their last scorer. Nathan Ciolk finished second with Coleson Cruzan (4th) and Kobe Canning (5th) not far behind. Tristan McHaney was back in action with a 7th place finish and Carson Foondle rounded out the scoring five with 10th place. Kaleb Canning, Christian Ringler and Malachi Graves finished 11th, 12th and 14th respectively. Ashton Byle was 16th, Avery Bowman 19th, Nik Parks 24th, Wyatt Karnes 25th, Keagan Kailing 30th, Jarrett Warlick 36th, and Zane Keith was 37th. The Lady Harriers finished third behind Kent City and Morley-Stanwood. Annie Feldpausch was 11th, Kiara Edwards 12th, Ryleigh Balke 17th, Allie Rodriguez 21st, Jolena Deaton 23rd, CeCe Rodriguez 224th, and Sydnee Ochs finished 28th. Nice job ladies! Story by Joseph Mclean Kent City 50 Holton 38 This game was destined to be a shootout, and it was certainly that. This was a game where the defenses needed to show up, and after a blowup of points early the defenses settled in. It was a rockin' crowd in Holton as a big time matchup between two powerhouses took place. Holton needed a win to prove they are legit, and the Eagles needed a win after their two weeks off to give them confidence when they put their playoff life on the line. This game opened with the classic maneuver from the Red Devils, the onside kick. It pays off again as they steal a possession, but on the first play the Eagles steal the possession as Webb Longcore picks off the red hot passer Fowler. The Eagles take over for their first drive, but the Devils defense flashes with a forced three and out. The Devils get up to mid field, and Fowler comes back attacking as he fires a deep ball to Bret Hosmer after he burns the defender for the touchdown. Fowler takes the two pointer in himself and Holton takes the lead 8-0. The Eagles get the ball back, and run on the back of the premier rusher Mason Westbrook. Westbrook does what he always does, and breaks tackles for the 17 yard power run for the touchdown. The conversion fails and the score is 8-6. Holton gets the kick to about mid field, and Fowler finds an open Erickson on the crossing route that gets down to the 9 yard line. Larson saves the touchdown on that play, but on the following play Fowler throws his 2nd touchdown pass hitting Robins this time who catches it, and takes a big hit in the endzone. It’s the Fowler Robins connection again on the two point as Robins creates a second of separation, and hauls it in to make it a 16-6 Devils lead with 7:32 left in the first quarter. The Eagles get the ball back, and it’s back to big man Westbrook for another 20 yard gain down the right side. They go right back to the right side with a Larson 14 yard scamper for a first down. Westbrook gets his number called again, and he rumbles, bumbles, and stumbles into a huddle of both teams across the goal line for the touchdown. The two point try is no good after the pass from Larson misses. The score with 6:47 left the Red Devils lead the Eagles 16-12. A combo of passes to Robins then Erickson gets the Devils going on the next drive. After a short pass to Erickson they go back to him, and he makes a big play making people miss to go inside the five. There was also some laundry discovered on the play, a holding penalty backed them all the way back. Fowler tries to back away from the line to avoid the pressure, but the KC defense gets to him and the pass is incomplete. On 3rd & 20 Luke Heeringa drops Fowler in the backfield to make it 4th & 25. Cartwright booms a punt that would pin the Eagles inside their own 25 at the 22. The Eagles start out with what looked like a direct snap to Longcore that gets 4 yards. Larson looks to pass to Carlson, but the ball is batted down by Rice Robins. Westbrook gets the carry on 3rd & 6, and gets about 4 to make it a 4th & a long 1. The Eagles go to ole reliable Westbrook to get them the yard for the 1st down. On 2nd & 5 Larson fakes the handoff, busts it to the right, and hits the gas for the touchdown to put the Eagles up for the first time of the night. Westbrook easy does it for the 2 pt to give the Eagles the 20-16 lead. On the last drive of the 1st quarter Fowler hits Erickson, Nichols, and then on the last play hits Robins to get just outside the red zone. The second frame opens with an Edgerton carry, a incomplete pass to Erickson over his head, and then Erickson catching the crossing route breaking for the endzone that’s stopped when Westbrook comes out of nowhere shot out of a cannon smacking Erickson. The Devils take back the lead after Fowler rolls to the right, and hits Nichols wide open for the touchdown. Fowler fakes the throw left, gets the whole defense to shift, flips his hips to the right, and goes over the top of the KC defender to Robins waiting for the pass for the 2 pt. Holton goes back on top 24-20 with 10:40 left in the 2nd quarter. The Eagles pick up their next drive at mid field, and immediately give it to Westbrook who breaks another run into Red Devil territory, and is brought down by Erickson. The Red Devil defense stands up the Eagles on 3 straight plays, but Larson goes up the middle, cuts it to the left making people miss, and finds paydirt into the endzone. After Larson’s 2nd rushing TD of the night, they run the exact same play and go up 28-24 with 7:47 left. From the 40 yard line, Fowler rolls left with defenders chasing him and finds Erickson who wiggles down the left sideline to flip the field on a nice pitch and catch. The Devils look to move in on the score with a throw to Robins along the home sideline. They try to go back to Robins a couple plays later, he’s covered heavily with the ball getting fought for being tipped around, and it looked to be intercepted off the bounce by Westbrook. Kent City starts celebrating, but they call it incomplete. The Devils get a break, but they shoot themselves in the foot on the next play. Fowler avoids the sack on 4th down and throws the deep ball to Erickson who’s all alone, but it bounces off his hands for what should have been an easy touchdown. You can point this moment out as one that maybe changed the whole game. The Devils would have taken the lead halfway through the 2nd quarter, but turned it over on downs. Mason Westbrook sees the open daylight to the endzone, but Fowler makes a touchdown saving tackle as he clips him at the ankles. The Eagles slowly work it down the field running the ball with everyone. On 4th down the Devils could have gotten the biggest break when Westbrook fumbled the ball at the goal line, and the ball rolled at the feet of players into the endzone to be recovered by the Eagles with 25 seconds left in the half. Westbrook goes left and puts the Eagles up 36-24 to go into the half. Coming out of the break, Fowler goes dual threat mode with a big gainer pass to Robins, and then a big time finesse run to get the Devils into scoring position deep in Kent City territory. Fowler rolled left, tried to play hero ball, and got picked off in the endzone by Webb Longcore. Larson has been running it in all game, but shows off his arm strength with a bomb TD pass to Sutton down the KC sideline. With the 2 pt, they go up 20 quickly with a 44-24 lead. They look to distance themselves early in the 2nd half. After a good return by Hosmer, the Devils look to get into the red zone, but the pass goes off Erickson’s hands. A mix of run and pass eventually leads to a Fowler to Nichols TD pass that keeps the Devs alive. Fowler to Robins 2 pt makes the score 44-32 with the Eagles leading late in the 3rd quarter. Eagles move down the field quickly, and Larson makes a hero play. Almost looking like a jump pass to an open wide receiver in the endzone for a 20 yard TD pass. Larson gets banged up on the play so Zane Kick has to come in, and the 2 pt is no good. The Eagles lead 50-32 to end the 3rd quarter. The Eagles look to get their shot in the arm to get them in the hunt for a playoff berth. The final frame opens with the Devs striking quickly as Fowler rolls left, tells Hosmer to go deep, throws it to him, and Hosmer makes some moves to get his 2nd TD of the night. The Devs pull within 2 scores as KC leads 50-38. The Eagles look to put the game away, but eventually the Devils D stifled Larson and he fumbles the handoff with a Robins recovery to give the Devs life late. Fowler rolls left to make a play, but gets dropped by big bad Joe Anderson. It gets worse from there as Fowler gets sandwiched, and throws a pick to Kyler Larson just inside the 50 yard line. The Eagles look to put this game away….. officially. Larson calls his own number to the left, high steps, goes down, and out of the game. Larson comes back into the game, and looked to have fumbled it to the Devs with Robins recovering again, but after discussion there’s no fumble. A dead ball personal foul on that play backs them up with 4th & 20, the Eagles punt it and pin it at the 10 yard line. Fowler shows off his arm, and throws dimes all over the field to push the possession. Fowler makes back to back big plays with a beautiful ball to Erickson down the middle of the field carrying defenders, and then a bobbled snap picked up by Fowler who became shifty to pick up yardage. The KC defense stifled, the offense came out to run the clock down, and got a signature win. KC comes into town and gets the job done with a 50-38 win over a winning Holton team. Bill Crane gets the ice bath from the water coolers, and they get their confidence booster for when they go on the road at White Cloud next week. The Devs lose a heartbreaker at home. They need to not let this take up space in their mind because they have a big rivalry game with Hesperia next week at Red Devil Stadium. KC goes to 3-2 (2-1) and Holton falls to 3-3 (2-2). Tri County 20 Fremont 12 In a defensive battle the Vikings drew first blood after a scoreless first quarter when Tyler Tompkins capped a TC drive with a 4 yard run and the hosts jumped out 6-0. Alex Gleason was taking the snaps behind center for the Packers and soon after the TC TD he found an open Wei Chen and 54 yards later the score was tied after Wachter’s PAT was blocked. TC scored again before the half when Tompkins fired a strike to Braden Hallman for a 64 yard score. Once again the conversion failed sending the teams to intermission with the Vikes up 12-6. Halfway through the 3rd Ian Boden stepped in front of a Gleason pass, resulting in a pick 6 and after the 2 point run by Nate Lovell the Vikings were up 20-6. In the 4th Justin Dirheimer fired through a hole and 14 yards later put up 6 for the Pack. Once again the PAT was blocked and the Vikings held a 20-12 lead that would hold up for the win. Dirheimer led the visitors on the ground picking up 113 yards. Gleason hit on 17 passes for 239 yards and Chen pulled in 9 of those for 160 yards. MIchael Romero Owen VandenBerg and Conner Pettis led he D in tackles. TC’s Tompkins hit on 6 passes for 116 yards and Trent Behrenwald grinded out 78 tough yards against an inspired Packer D line. Tri County (4-1, 5-1) will host Central Montcalm while Fremont (0-5, 0-6) hosts equally winless Chip Hills. White Cloud 28 Lakeview 14 From Coach Gorman: White Cloud celebrated their homecoming Friday night with a win over Lakeview. Leading the way was Jaden Vandam with 3 touchdown receptions from Mason Ruether and Jace Silverthorn connected with Taylor Bode for another TD. Jace also led rushing with 69 yards, Landyn McGowen steamrolled 53 and Austin Cook added 14. Defensively it was a team effort as 16 of 21 players had at least one tackle.Silverthorn led with 12, Enrique Bowman had 7, Wes Penland, Landyn McGowen, Austin Cook and Alex Cruzan each added 6 tackles respectively. The boys are 4-2 and welcome Kent City this Friday night at home! Morley Stanwood 70 Hesperia 6 Hesperia (0-3,0-5) visits Holton this week. Ciolk, Feldpausch lead Varsity teams
On Saturday, October 2nd, the White Cloud Cross Country team traveled to Shepherd, MI to participate in the 72 team Shepherd Invitational. The Varsity boys competed against 22 of those teams in the Jays division made up of D3 and D4 teams. White Cloud finished fourth, 2 places ahead of their projected finish and was the first D4 team, as places first, second, and third were achieved by D3 schools that are ranked in the top ten for the State. Nathan Ciolk led the way, with a a15th place finish. He ran his season best time of 17:27. Kobe Canning and Coleson Cruzan finished in 26th and 27th place, respectively. Carson Foondle was 30th, cutting 40 seconds off his personal best. All four earned medals for their efforts. Malachi Graves rounded out the top five, finishing 55th, Christian Ringler and Kaleb Canning were 63rd and 71st. There were 124 boys in the race. The JV boys had a much tougher field, as their race was combined with the JV runners from the teams in the Elite race. 233 runners competed and White Cloud's leader was Ashton Byle in 65th place with a season best 19:42. Avery Bowman set a personal best of 21:04 for 133rd place. They were followed by Keagan Kailing 160th, Wyatt Karnes 174th, Jarrett Warlick 223rd, and Zane Keith 229th. Both Jarrett and Zane set personal best times. The JV boys finished 17th out of 26 teams. The Varsity Lady Indians competed in the Jays Division with a field of 90 runners. Annie Feldpausch was our first runner with a 44th place finish and a time of 23:30. Courtney LaClair was 55th, Kiara Edwards 62nd, Jolena Deaton 74th, Ryleigh Balke 78th, CeCe Rodriguez 85th and Allie Rodriguez 86th. Courtney set a season best time of 24:40 and Allie set a personal best of 31:38. The girls finished 9th out of 19 teams. Photo and story by Alexis Mercer
Assisted by Bella McCamman On the field Friday night walked two evenly matched teams. The battle, though sometimes featuring two teams with better records this far in the season, would be another classic Grant vs. Newaygo game: full of heart and hustle. Defense was the name of the game in the first quarter. The Lions started with the ball and marched down the field but after a few dropped passes and a flag the Lions turned the ball over on the 20. Grant’s quarterback, Brady Jacobs, ran the ball 50 yards to start his night that ended with 230 yards and 31 carries and an additional 51 yards passing. But Newaygo’s defense stepped up and stopped the Tigers on 4th down and inches to get the ball back. The Lions’ only touchdown of the night came at 8:04 left in the 2nd quarter when Remy Wells power-housed his way into the end zone, putting the Lions up 6-0 and Josiah Long aced the extra point to make it 7. In the ensuing kickoff the Tigers drove down and scored on a 2 yard touchdown run by Cohen Garrod, but not without excitement in the play just before that. Facing 4th and 25, the Tigers sent it long and though the defense thought they broke it up, Nathan Lang ended up with the ball. Not having the luxury of replay, the reffing squad called it a catch. The PAT was unsuccessful so the Tigers were down by just 1. Newaygo walked into the locker room up 7-6. Grant got the ball to start the 2nd half. The star player of the night for the Tigers, Jacobs, led a 15 play drive taking up almost 7 minutes of the 3rd quarter. Jacobs himself scored on a 3 yard touchdown run. The PAT was once again no good, but that would turn out to be just fine for the Tigers. A 4th quarter scramble by the Lions led to an interception on the Lions’ 15 yard line with 7:15 left and then a 3 and out later in the quarter ended any hope the Lions had. From Grant’s coach: “Grant defense was led by Nolan Corvers with six tackles, including two tackles for loss. Treyton Railling had 5 tackles, followed by Sawyer Carr with four tackles, including one tackle for loss. Nathan Lang had four tackles, including one pass break up. Zachary Barnhart had two interceptions in the game for the great team defensive effort.” |
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